


Saving the World is a 12 Step Program

by janonny



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Avengers team and the newer characters, Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Canon-Typical Violence, Depression, End of the World, Fix-It, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Sharing a Bed, Sickfic, Team Dynamics, Time Travel, Trapped In A Closet, mostly in the first chapter, some elements of, then it gets better
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-01
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-06-02 05:21:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 34,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19434760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janonny/pseuds/janonny
Summary: Tony and Steve fall to pieces when Thanos’ wins.Then they pick themselves up, and find a solution. They also find something infinitely more precious in the process.-“It’s going to sound pretty outrageous,” Tony admitted, rubbing a hand over his brow. While he had put on some weight and wasn’t as gaunt anymore, he was still easily tired nowadays.“More outrageous than talking racoons and a purple villain traveling through space to collect magic stones?” Steve asked drily.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Coaster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/coaster/pseuds/coaster) for beta-reading this at top speed while giving me great feedback. Beta readers are just priceless for seeing the bigger picture, for reals. All mistakes are my own, especially since I continue to tinker with each chapter before I post.
> 
> I wanted to write angst but then it rapidly got out of control and suddenly Tony and Steve were on a fix-it adventure. Ah well… New chapters will be posted every Sunday/Monday!
> 
>  **Note:** Pepper and Tony are not together in this story and have never been together. They’re good friends but not lovers.

The first time Steve walked through the infirmary doors, Tony threw a cup at his head.

The second time, Tony had shouted until Steve left.

Tony had no room for Steve, no room for forgiveness, no room for words, no room for rationality. All he had within him was seething anger and desolation, viciousness and misery. He had nothing left in him to spare, nothing to eke out for polite conversations and stilted reconciliations.

The embers of fear in him had roared to life when he had woken up from sedation to find that almost everyone he loved had gone on a suicide mission to find Thanos and reverse what had happened. The terror had burned and ravaged as he imagined never finding out what happened to them, or that they were already dead as he lay there useless and breathing, too late again and again. Then the fear had been extinguished, along with any remaining slivers of hope, when they had all returned, every single one of them thank God, but returned empty handed.

Thanos dead, but no Stones. No more second chances, they had to live with the hand they had been dealt.

Pointless hope was a deadly poison that had eaten away any remaining strength Tony had to deal with the world at large. He was a husk of a man now, filled only with despair and pain, huddled in his bed, kept alive by a tube of nutrients and on sips of sugar water that he swallowed with lacklustre.

The next time Steve came into the room, Tony only rasped out, “Get out.”

And Steve did.

The time after that, Tony could muster no strength to do even that. He only lay staring up at the ceiling as Steve walked into the room, as Steve fidgeted with the IV drip before sitting on the chair beside the bed. Tony didn’t turn to look at him, expected to hear more words, more useless words spewed from the lying mouth of a useless man, to fall on the stubbornly unhearing ears of another useless man.

But Steve only sat there.

In the passing hours that he was there, he didn’t say a single word, only remained in the chair. He didn’t do anything, didn’t read a book, didn’t look around, didn’t start any conversations. The sunlight coming through the open windows were dimming when Steve got up, checked over Tony’s bed clinically, tucking a stray corner of a sheet in, and then he left.

For the first time in a long while, Tony felt a stirring of emotion beyond misery and anger.

He was curious.

\---

The silent bedside vigil repeated thrice more before Tony’s curiosity mutated into irritation. Tony suddenly turned to look at Steve, took in that pale drawn face, that stupid determined frown. Although he had seen Steve sitting there out of the periphery of his vision, he was still surprised to find Steve staring straight at him. He had thought that Steve was staring at the opposite wall or secretly looking at his phone. It unbalanced him to see that blue gaze focused entirely on him. Had he just been sitting there and staring like that for hours?

“Don’t you have better things to do than to creep by my bed?” Tony snapped.

“No, not really,” Steve said with a shrug, unaffected by Tony’s rising ire.

For some reason, that pissed Tony off. “What are you doing here? I’m not dying, if that’s what you’re eagerly anticipating.”

A sharp twitch from Steve’s fingers resting on his thighs gave away that the comment had been a direct hit. _Good_.

“You were right when you came back that day,” Steve said, the familiar thread of steel winding its way through Steve’s voice. “I wasn’t there for you. We were supposed to be in this together, win or lose, and I didn’t keep that promise to you. I want to change that now.”

“You arrogant bastard,” Tony hissed, his anger flaring up and spilling out. “You fucking arrogant asshole, why do you think I still want you to keep that promise? I don’t need you here, I don’t need your _worthless_ promises.”

Steve took the verbal pummelling with a clenched jaw and a steady, pained gaze. Fuck his stoic act, Tony didn’t give a damn how Steve felt about his anger.

“Do you want me to go?” Steve asked quietly.

“Get out,” Tony ordered with sudden tears in his eyes. He couldn’t take this rise of emotion in him, couldn’t have Steve here anymore. He needed to be alone. To be a shell of a body on his own.

Steve left.

\---

When Steve walked in the next day, Tony didn’t say anything, just stared at the ceiling in silence. Steve sat there even when Rhodey and Pepper came in and talked to Tony, held his hand like they always did. All Tony did was answer in monosyllables and continue staring at the ceiling in silence.

\---

It was so much easier to just lie there. Unmoving. Just staring up so he didn’t have to look at anything or anyone. None of it mattered anyway.

\---

Steve was there again. And the ceiling was there. And the world was just…there. Endless and pointless.

\---

When Tony cried silent tears, just letting them trail down his cheeks without even summoning the strength to wipe them away, a large hand squeezed his shoulder in silent comfort and dabbed at the tears with a cloth.

And Tony…let him.

\---

It happened again. More than once. 

\---

Then one day, Tony looked at Steve, really looked at him. He looked at the redness in his eyes, his limp hair and the stubble that was shaved off unevenly. Mostly, he looked at the dull blue gaze that stared right back at him, determined to be there, but just as shattered. The blind leading the blind, the broken offering comfort to the broken.

Tony didn’t say anything. But he didn’t yell either and he didn’t stare up at the ceiling once more.

Baby steps.

\---

One day, Tony looked at Steve to find that he was almost crying, that he was sitting there, silent by Tony’s bed with tears in his eyes. Something about the sight of those pale lashes, wet and spikey from tears that wouldn’t fall, those brows furrowed as if Steve could will his pain back into his tear ducts… It was like a spark in the gray haze of despair that had enveloped Tony.

Tony drew in a breath, felt his lungs shudder as he watched a tear fall from the corner of Steve’s eyes, track down his cheek with painful slowness.

And Steve squeezed his eyes shut, pressed his lips tight together to stop the visible tremble.

Tony didn’t know why he did it, not when he could barely see through his own fog of pain and numbness, but he reached out and placed his hand over Steve’s.

More tears slipped down those pale cheeks as Steve inhaled sharply, as he turned his hand over, laced his fingers through Tony’s.

They didn’t speak.

\---

One day, Tony gripped Steve’s hand and he said, “Help me sit up.”

Steve looked at him, almost uncomprehending.

“I need to do something,” Tony said, quiet, realizing even as he said it how uncharacteristic it was for Steve to be here, day in and day out, not doing anything but sit there with Tony, not working and leading and trying to fix things.

That needed to change.

“What do you need to do?” Steve asked, helping lift Tony into a sitting position.

“I need to…” Tony paused, mind sluggish as he tried to figure out where to start, what to do. He knew the others, Pepper and Rhodey, Natasha and Bruce, they were all working around the clock, trying to hold the world together. Tony should start there, should pitch in too. But he felt so tired and so…lost. He needed to look at what happened, he needed to stare into the abyss. “I need to see for myself what happened.”

Pain crumpled Steve’s features in a way that Tony never, ever expected to see. It was a glimpse into the raw despair held deep in Steve’s chest, and he could see Steve visibly trying to push it all down again, to seal up the endless well of pain. Steve drew in a sharp breath, hands clenched. “Don’t. Tony, don’t do this to yourself.”

“It’s not. It’s not about that,” Tony said, waving his hand sharply, only it turned into a weak, vague gesture. “I need to do this to be sure I know where to start. And you, you need to do something else.”

“Do what?” Steve asked with a frown.

“Something else. _Anything else_. Go ask Nat and Rhodey what help they need. Go do something, and come back when you need a break. Sitting here every day isn’t helping,” Tony said sharply, forcing the words out through the spike of unease that Steve was leaving, that Steve wouldn’t be here, that things would go terribly wrong once again.

Steve began, voice quiet and low, “I said I would—”

Digging his fingers into his blanket, Tony snapped, “I know what you said. I _know_. And…we need to talk about it. Later. But not now. I can’t do _this—_ ” he gestured between them, “—right now. But there are other things you and I both can be doing, and you know that too.”

He could see Steve stifle his first instinctive protest, bite down on it and search Tony’s eyes instead, searching for the truth of his feelings and words. Whatever he saw there, if there was anything left to see, was enough for Steve to nod stiffly, to get up with a jerk and walk to the door.

At the doorway, Steve paused and looked back, said quietly, “Even if it didn’t help you, sitting here with you helped me.”

Then he was out the door.

Tony stared blankly at the empty doorway, completely floored by that. Then he ran a tired hand over his face and rolled his eyes even though no one was there to see it. Steve fucking Rogers, ladies and gentlemen, cutting through cynicism and self-pity with a single sentence.

\---

The next few days, Steve checked in frequently, came in with updates on what the others were doing and what he was working on.

Sometimes, the updates were:

“Someone tried to storm the White House and Rhodey had to intervene. He’s okay, but it was…bad. I made him promise to call you later.”

“We heard from Nebula and Rocket. They’ve helped rescue a stranded spaceship that had been too badly damaged to be repaired by their remaining crew.”

“Carol called. In her words, the universe is still fucked up.”

And sometimes the updates were:

“Pepper had to go back to California, her mom had a heart attack. She’s going to be okay, it was just the…it was just everything.”

“I found Nat on the floor in the kitchen today, crying. I joined her for awhile.”

“Valkyrie says that Thor hasn’t stopped drinking since he came back. She says he doesn’t look like he’s ever going to stop drinking.”

Other than the depressing news updates, Steve was much more involved at the street level, keeping the place safe from opportunistic heartless criminals, running groups to place children who lost their families in temporary living arrangements, setting up community watches because he couldn’t do this all on his own.

When Steve talked, he watched what Tony was doing. Which was a whole lot of fuck-all.

Steve thought Tony was doing this to torture himself, to beat himself up over what happened. He didn’t say as much, but he didn’t have to, with the pained blue gaze trained on Tony.

And maybe he was right. It was hard to tell these days, with the tangled mire of brilliant insights dragging through the sludge of depression.

It just felt like a place to start, so he was going to start there because he didn’t know what else to do.

Tony flipped through the holographic displays of the people who were missing, the key players in their world of superpowers, unusual abilities and secret organizations. At each person, he stared hard at the data F.R.I.D.A.Y. had gathered for him, took in when they were last seen, the footage of how they had turned to dust if such video existed and was accessible. A lot of the footage centered around events in Wakanda, recordings taken from War Machine, from various satellites, from Wakandan video feeds that Okoye had kindly shared with him.

It did seem like some form of self-torture, but for Tony, once he confirmed they were gone, he moved to the next person.

He needed to know for sure they were gone. He couldn’t live with the uncertainty that something else had happened to them, that they had been injured or taken or lost like he had, floating in nothingness waiting to die while no one else knew if he was alive or gone. No matter how unlikely it was that they still lived, he needed to check and be sure.

He flipped to the next hologram.

\---

Tony cried with Rhodey when Rhodey described how he had called and called for Sam, how he never saw Sam go. He had never been close to Sam, but seeing Rhodey’s reddened eyes, the tears in his eyes as his voice cracked, Tony’s heart broke all over again.

There was never any footage or confirmation that Sam had gone with the others. But the battlefield had been scoured. Tony placed the file in the ‘unconfirmed’ folder anyway, because he couldn’t verify it with his own eyes. Maybe because he couldn’t let it go.

\---

Tony’s hands trembled as he expanded the video on the holographic display, watched as the street camera showed Peter’s aunt looking out of the window of her car in confusion, from where she had been frantically driving to Peter’s school. He watched as she blinked and never opened her eyes again as she crumbled to nothing more than specks of dust.

He had needed to see this with his own eyes, even though he already knew what had happened, had asked F.R.I.D.A.Y. the moment he was coherent again…had needed to know if he had to make that painful phone call.

He hadn’t. And a selfish part of him was relieved that he hadn’t needed to, was relieved that she didn’t have to go through the pain of losing Peter. A selfish part of him wished he could escape the same way.

\---

Tony stared at yet another footage, stared until Steve came up behind him and touched him gently on his shoulder. This time, Tony was in a wheelchair instead, tired of being in bed. He had graduated to drinking juices too, with a few mouthfuls of mushy food daily.

“You need to stop doing this to yourself,” Steve said, quiet.

“I will when you will,” Tony retorted.

Steve sounded frustrated when he replied, “You didn’t seem to think that four weeks ago.”

And now, maybe now was the time for their talk.

“I was…not in my right mind, four weeks ago,” Tony said, words coming out stilted.

“You weren’t,” Steve agreed, and then went on to disagree anyway because that was the kind of irritating person he was, “But you were telling the truth. And you were right.”

“Oh, fuck off with bearing the burden of the whole world on your shoulders there. And don’t fucking tell me what I think,” Tony snapped, feeling his ire rising once more.

Steve stared him straight in the eyes and asked, “Can you honestly say you didn’t mean it?”

Tony bit down his first instinct to be contrary. He took a measured breath and replied, “Yes, I meant it. It doesn’t mean I was right, you can record that for posterity. And before you argue, I don’t think I was totally wrong either.”

Sighing, Steve rubbed his forehead. “What do you mean, Tony?”

“I mean, the talking raccoon was right. There’s blame to go around. If Thor had gone for the head, if Quill hadn’t freaked out, if I had managed to get that gauntlet off…” Tony felt a sharp, wrenching pang of guilt and self-loathing at the memory of how close they had been.

“Lots of ‘ifs’ there,” Steve pointed out.

“If the team hadn’t split up, if we had all been together…maybe the kid would still be here. Maybe everyone…would still be here,” Tony looked down, felt like his head was too heavy to hold up, sank his face down into his hand. He rubbed an open palm over his face, scrubbed away the wetness on his unshaven cheeks.

When he looked up, Steve was staring back at him with his own pain and unshed tears in his eyes, making no move to hide them. “That was on me.”

“That was on _us_ ,” Tony retorted sharply. “The fate of the world doesn’t actually rest on your shoulders alone.”

“I know. But I know what I did too. What you said? _No trust. Liar_.” Steve said the words with hushed vehemence, matching Tony’s own vitriol and hate when he had first spat them out. How many times had Steve replayed Tony’s furious words over and over again in his head to be able to pitch them exactly right? “You’re right. I was a liar. I didn’t trust you when I should, and I broke the team as a result just because I was afraid…”

Tony waved his hand, trying to cut Steve off. “I didn’t trust you either when it came to Ultron, and again with Vision. The lack of trust ran both ways. I’ve been angry with you for so long, but I know the truth is…it took the two of us to break the team. We did it together.”

Steve looked like he was deflating, his broad shoulders drawing closer and his head dipping. He sounded so lost when he said, “But what I did…was personal. Personal beyond Ultron. I’m sorry for that.”

The thing was that Tony knew that. He had known the moment Steve had looked at him in that Siberian bunker, with fear and regret in his eyes; he had known that Steve was sorry. But he hadn’t been ready to hear it then and he hadn’t been ready to talk it out at that time. And now, here they were…

“I’m sorry too, Steve,” Tony said, sorrier than he had ever felt before in his life, wondering how things might be different if they had actually _talked_ things through, on numerous different occasions. He fell quiet for a moment, then he continued, struggling to put his feelings into words, “What I said when I just got back to Earth… I don’t know if we could have stopped Thanos even if you had been there. But I wanted you to be there anyway. If we lose, we do it together. I didn’t know how much I had internalized and believed in that until I looked across that cursed red planet and realized you hadn’t been there. That you weren’t there with me.”

“Tony…” Steve’s voice cracked, his expression heavy with guilt and loss.

“No, I’m not saying that to blame you. I’m trying to explain, pretty crappily I admit, that I was irrational when I said it the first time, that it was crazy to say you should have been there on an alien planet somehow. But there was a nugget of truth there. We’re better and stronger when we face everything _together_.”

“That’s…yeah, I’m with you on that,” Steve said, the smile on his face tremulous but firming up the longer Tony met his eyes, showed him that he was serious.

“I’m going to need you here with me on this, Steve,” Tony continued, even as he knew that this was going to be a lot after the failures they had experienced. But he knew Steve could handle this, because it was _Steve_. “We need to be together, as a team again.”

There was a kind of joyful fragile hope in Steve’s blue eyes that Tony knew he would do anything to preserve. He hadn’t even realized that all that optimism had been burned out until this moment, until Steve was looking at him like this. “Yeah, I’m up for that, Tony.”

Tony took a deep breath and said carefully, “That’s good, because we need to be ready, especially for everything that comes next.”

Frowning and looking a little confused, Steve asked, “What’s coming next?”

Tony turned back to the holographic projection, back to the image of the rooftop and the strange contraption on it. “Next, we save the world.”


	2. Chapter 2

They headed out to San Francisco. Tony had wanted to go alone, but Steve had stubbornly insisted he come along and correctly pointed out that Tony was in no shape to travel anywhere on his own yet. There was something else behind Steve’s insistence on sticking close by, but Tony was too exhausted to brood over it. Instead, he had handed over a familiar red, white and blue shield with a quip about how he didn’t need it as a salad bowl anymore. He had pretended not to see the wetness in Steve’s eyes when he had taken back the shield, the way his smile had been warmer than the sunrise itself.

The elevator door opened to a near empty rooftop and Steve wheeled Tony out in his wheelchair. In a different lifetime, Tony would have never agreed to be seen in public in a wheelchair. And he was definitely recovered enough to walk around with some help these days. But he still felt waves of tiredness, and the world was in enough of a turmoil that people had no shits to give about one Tony Stark. In another lifetime, that would have been a novel and exciting prospect.

But not this one.

Pushing the wheelchair to the van on the roof, Steve asked, “Saving the world involves a van that mysteriously made its way up to this roof?”

Tony had remained mostly tight-lipped about what this was about, wanting to get more substantial information before raising Steve’s hopes. Well, now was the time to find out.

“Saving the world is going to be a 12 step program. This is just the first step,” Tony said, pushing himself out of the wheelchair with shaky arms.

Steve was right next to him immediately, an arm around his waist, another hand on Tony’s elbow, as if Steve was ready to scoop Tony up at any moment. Tony rolled his eyes and tried to bat Steve away, but it was a wasted attempt.

There was a part of Tony who just wanted to lean on Steve, who felt this grateful relief that he had Steve by his side this time. He wanted to put his weight on Steve, feel his comforting strength holding him up.

But he knew he couldn’t. Not right now. He needed to stand up straight, to push himself through this, because he wasn’t sure he could keep going if he let himself fall into Steve’s arms.

When Steve remained stubbornly there, supporting him, Tony let himself lean on Steve just the slightest bit as he walked slowly forward. He tapped the side of his glasses as he moved, starting the scans that fed information back to the lens of his glasses. The back of the van was open and there was a machine in there which Tony could make a good guess on what it was based on Pym’s past research and the satellite images taken of the roof before what they now called the Vanishing. His current scans only strengthened his theory on Pym’s shiny toy.

He looked over the machine in front of the van, looked at the buttons, and peered into the van with all its ominous chrome rings.

“You might want to step back for this part, just in case it goes wrong,” Tony told Steve.

Steve gave him an incredulous look. “You think I’m going to step back after you said that?”

“What’s the point of both of us getting blown up?” Tony asked acerbically.

“What’s the point of _you_ getting blown up?” Steve snapped back. “We take the risk together or you find a better way to do whatever it is you want to do.”

Rolling his eyes, Tony examined the control panel again. “Fine, fine. I don’t think it’s going to do anything really bad, it was just a precaution.”

When Tony reached out for the release button on the panel, Steve pulled his shield off the harness strapped across his back and held the shield in front of him and Tony, providing what protection he could from an actual explosion.

At the touch of the button, light surged through the back of the van, accompanied by a ‘whoomp’ of a sound. Then _something_ was spat out the back of the van, tumbling a few feet along the ground before coming to a stop with a groan.

That something turned out to be a human, as Tony already suspected. It was Scott Lang, in full Ant-Man costume. He was still alive, as testified by the moan he let out before pushing himself into a sitting position.

“What the hell happened? What were you doing, Hank?” Scott demanded, before looking up. “Wait… You aren’t Hank. Where is he? Where’s Hope and Jan? Captain America, what are you doing here?”

Ah, Tony knew he hadn’t factored something into all of this.

Steve gripped Tony’s arm as he said as levelly as he could, “Scott, we need to talk.”

\---

The first thing they did was drop Scott off at Cassie’s house. Steve and Tony sat in the car outside, not looking at the front door as Scott pulled Cassie into a bear hug.

Steve had first delivered the news with a stiff back and clenched jaw. Now, he sat with the same stiffness, staring out the windscreen, hand tight around the gear stick.

Not letting himself dwell on what he was doing, Tony reached out and placed his hand over Steve’s, squeezing softly. He didn’t move, didn’t say anything until he felt Steve’s clenched grip loosen under his touch.

“That…wasn’t great,” Tony said quietly.

“No, it wasn’t,” Steve agreed, drawing in a deep breath before letting it out slowly. Finally, he turned to look at Tony, blue eyes tracing over Tony’s face. “This was why you were looking at all the videos of the people we knew who went missing. You wanted to be sure they were really gone or if they needed saving. It’s why we came all the way here. If you hadn’t done that, Scott would have been trapped…who knows how long.”

Tony squirmed under Steve’s admiring gaze, shaking his head in honesty. “Yes…and also no.”

Frowning, Steve asked, “What do you mean?”

“Yes, that’s why I was looking at those videos. But no, that isn’t the only reason why we came here,” Tony admitted.

The frown cleared and Steve nodded. “The first step in your 12 step program.”

So Steve was listening, even to his nonsensical prattle. Tony asked, trying to push down on the spike of anxiety, “Rhodey confirmed he was arranging the transportation of that van on the roof?”

“Yes, Tony, he did. Are you going to tell me how this will help us save the world?” Steve prompted.

“It’s going to sound pretty outrageous,” Tony admitted, rubbing a hand over his brow. While he had put on some weight and wasn’t as gaunt anymore, he was still easily tired nowadays.

Steve was frowning, he always seemed to be frowning these days, but he didn’t ask how Tony was feeling. It was something Tony appreciated about him. While Steve was a persistent presence who pressed Tony to rest and eat and do his physio, he never went overboard with his coddling. His style of nursemaiding involved a lot more stubborn bossiness than kids’ gloves, and it was like he had a sixth sense as to what he could get away with when it came to Tony’s contrariness about his existing weakness.

“More outrageous than talking racoons and a purple villain traveling through space to collect magic stones?” Steve asked drily.

“Point taken,” Tony said with a wry quirk to his lips. “Alright. Based on F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s initial satellite scans and my readings once we got on the roof, what Lang had in that van was a quantum tunnel. He was using it to research things that go very, very small. But space and time are intertwined, so I’m theorizing that if you go into the quantum tunnel in the right way, you could also mess with time. You could potentially go into the quantum tunnel at a specific point in time, and come out on the other side at a different point in time in the past.”

Steve mulled over this for a few seconds and then surmised, “You’re talking about a time machine.”

Sighing, Tony tried to hide a smile but from the way Steve’s own lips curved up, he was probably unsuccessful. “Yes, fine, we’re talking about a time machine.”

“And you want to go back in time and change what happened?” Steve asked, his eyes laser focused on Tony in a way that he hadn’t forgotten. This was Steve on a mission.

“Not exactly. Any change that happens in our past will not affect our present, it will only create a new timeline. We can’t change our past, but we can utilize some things from our past,” Tony pointed out, a little tentative.

Steve’s eyes widened, catching on without Tony saying another word. “You want to use the Infinity Stones from our past.”

“Well, as you said earlier; the Infinity Stones can do anything. They’re the only things that can fix this.”

For a moment, Steve only sat there searching Tony’s gaze, sweeping over his face like he was taken in by what he could see. Which didn’t make sense because what he could see was probably an old decrepit man who was past his use-by date and was mostly a tired husk pretending to be functional. And yet, Steve stared.

“How do we confirm if the time travel works?” was all Steve asked, no doubt or question about Tony’s theory. Knowing that Steve believed in him still, to this degree, was almost enough to make Tony want to slump down in his seat. But he kept his posture straight, kept his dignity intact.

“We ask Lang,” Tony proposed.

\---

Everyone was gathered around the table, hustled out from wherever they had been holed up or dialling in from space. Carol had already joined the communication channel, her hologram projected against a blank wall, while Thor was still a silent, hulking form made of pure self-loathing. Tony had been there, and maybe he would still be there if he didn’t have a purpose now.

They had found Natasha in the central command room. Her eyes had been red, nose swollen in a telltale way that indicated a lot of crying. Tony had never seen her so emotional and shattered, but then, this was everyone at their lowest. Her latest attempt to find Clint had been a bust. She was still convinced he was alive because she had missed a call from him while they had been trying to figure out what the hell happened on the battlefield after Thanos left abruptly. But when she had made the trip out, his farm had been empty of people. It was a grim hint as to what had happened.

She had taken one look at them and wiped her tears away, ready to face whatever came next. Steve squeezed her shoulder in passing, looking like he was trying to comfort her, but his tension was palpable enough that she caught it, eyes sharp as she looked between the two of them.

Tony had abandoned his wheelchair this time, walking slowly so he could sink down into a desk chair instead.

Coming up behind him, Rhodey squeezed his upper arm and leaned against the side of the chair. “Scott’s van is parked outside. I never expected a day you would ask for me to use a Quinjet as a van-moving service, but I did a great job of it anyway.”

“You do great at everything, sugarplum,” Tony agreed amenably.

“Any reason why Scott didn’t just shrink his van instead and bring it along?” Natasha asked, leaning against the desk and raising an eyebrow at him.

Natasha was always a sharp one. Tony explained, “We can’t afford to waste the number of Pym particle vials that he has.”

“Okay, mind telling us what’s going on then?” Rhodey asked just as Rocket and Nebula’s communication channels finally lit up and their images projected into the room. They were the last people to the meeting.

Steve looked around the room, hands resting on his belt. “You guys remember Scott Lang? Otherwise known as Ant-Man.”

Scott gave a little dorky wave at that introduction.

“I don’t remember,” Nebula stated bluntly, staring between Scott and Steve.

Tony waved his hand and explained, “He’s a guy who can turn real small and then real big. That’s all you need to know about him.”

“Sounds useless,” Nebula mused aloud.

“Hey!” Scott protested.

Tony continued, “But more importantly, he was experimenting with going very, very small and entering the quantum realm when he got stuck in there because…because Thanos used the Stones and the people who were supposed to pull Scott out weren’t there anymore. We managed to get him out and discovered something interesting. Scott?”

Scott’s expression was pained at Tony’s explanation, but he swallowed and responded with only a slight waver in his voice, “When I came out of the quantum tunnel, Mister America, I mean, Captain America said it had been seven weeks since I entered the quantum realm. But for me, it had only been six to seven minutes max.”

“So you got knocked on your head and can’t tell the time now, big whoop. I don’t need a knock on my head to have the same effect,” grumbled Rocket.

Scott had been told ahead of time by Steve about Rocket being a talking raccoon and Nebula being a blue alien, but that didn’t stop Scott from staring like a total rube. It also didn’t stop Scott from responding with snark. “I don’t know about where you come from, but for us humans, we can definitely tell the difference in time between a few _weeks_ and a few _minutes_. For one, I wasn’t dead from dehydration and starvation when they pulled me out of the quantum realm.”

Tony suppressed a wince at the words dehydration and starvation, what with his close encounter to both.

“He’s right, it’s not something he would get mixed up about,” Steve interjected.

“Where are you going with this?” Thor asked, seemingly to wake up from his sullen silence.

Bruce was already shaking his head, meeting Tony’s gaze straight on. “No, that’s not possible. It’s a fluke that he even managed to make it out alive, let alone at the right point. You can’t possibly—”

“Can someone translate for those who don’t have telepathy?” Carol interrupted with raised eyebrows.

“They’re talking about time travel,” Rocket jumped in. “Time travel through this quantum realm.”

There was the briefest of silence as everyone who hadn’t caught the clue took in the meaning of this.

Then a pandemonium of questions, demands and suggestions was unleashed.

Tony sighed, rubbing his forehead. It was going to be a long night.

\---

It was funny how the more things changed, the more things stayed the same. 

The Avengers compound was bustling with energy and people, everyone back in one place and working with an edge of mania towards their final goal. Carol, Rocket and Nebula had all come back to Earth, adding to their numbers.

No one said it, but it was an unspoken thread running between all of them that this whole thing might be a fool’s errand. It might be a complete waste of time and energy. Countless people across the universe might be dead and gone for good, but rather than confront the uncertain nature of their mission, they all worked with frenzied speed, like they could get ahead of the awful possibilities if they just paddled a little faster.

Despite all that was going on, sometimes Tony woke up in bed and it was like nothing had changed. He was still sleeping in the medbay, couldn’t make himself move out of it for some reason.

Sometimes he shook awake in the dark, waking up from the cold echo of space, shivering from the feel of grit and death beneath his fingernails as he tried to hold on to a disintegrating body. Some nights he woke up from the terror of walking down a spaceship’s ramp to have no one greet him…to know everyone had gone while he was away, to know Steve…

He opened his eyes to a familiar ceiling and bland walls. They really should look into redecorating. What art style would best suit their post-apocalyptical era?

Tony turned his head a little and startled, almost pulling his blankets up like they would shield him. By his bed, Steve sat quietly, his face expressionless despite having been caught staring and watching his teammate sleep like a weirdo.

“What are you doing?” Tony asked, his voice rough from sleep. “Why are you re-enacting creepy scenes out of Twilight?”

Whether Steve got the reference or not, he just shrugged in response. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“And you thought the best alternative was to watch me sleep?” Tony asked with incredulity.

Eyes flicking away, Steve said, “I was just checking on you and then I decided to sit down for a bit. I— I’ll just go.”

It was only then that Tony finally managed to blink the sleep and nightmare from his eyes, managed to shake off the waspishness he felt from rest disrupted by terrible dreams and really took notice of how Steve looked. His blond hair was a mess, like he had spent much of the night tossing and turning; his eyes were just the slightest bit swollen, like he had spent much of the night with tears leaking from them.

Sleepless nights or nightmares. Pick your poison.

“Wait,” Tony said, reaching out and snagging Steve’s wrist. “That wasn’t saying you should go. I was just asking why and I get it now, watching me sleep is probably more interesting than watching television. I’m an entertaining kind of guy.”

“Don’t let it get to your head,” Steve retorted, but at least he settled back into his chair.

The silence between them felt unexpectedly peaceful. It was unusual, because when it was just the two of them, it was either bristling energy or probing dialogue. They never did anything peacefully together.

Maybe something had changed between them, after everything they had gone through, after the shared grief and intense conversations, something had shifted.

It felt kind of nice.

Which was when Steve broke the quiet moment with a question. “What was your nightmare about?”

Tony shot Steve an irritated look. Trust Steve to disrupt the peace because he couldn’t leave well alone. But Tony’s annoyance didn’t last under Steve’s tired but steady gaze. Maybe this was something else that had changed. Tony didn’t feel the need to shore up his defenses anymore around Steve, and it felt different showing his soft belly to Steve when he knew Steve’s own vulnerabilities too.

“It was…Peter. Going. And how it felt, under my hands…” Tony drew in a deep breath, continued in a cracked voice, “And if that wasn’t bad enough, when I turned around, there was no one there. Not even Nebula. And there was no one when I came back, because…I was alone. Alone in the whole universe. And it was all my fault.”

His voice was shaking at the end of it, but he felt the warmth of Steve’s hand settle on top of his own, squeezing, trying to give him strength. Tony turned his hand over to grip back, grip back as tight as he could because he knew Steve could take it with his supersoldier strength and innate steadiness.

The pit in his stomach from loss, from remembering everyone that had crumbled away, felt like an echo that would never fade. But Steve’s hand on his was an anchor, holding him in place in his vast grief. It hurt so bad, but he wasn’t being blown away by the immensity of it anymore, not with the people he had by his side.

He turned to Steve, asked in a quiet voice, “What about you? What do you dream about?”

Tony both wanted to know and dreaded to find out. But he felt compelled to ask regardless of his conflicted feelings. He hoped he could provide Steve with the same comfort; he hoped Steve would find his own anchor somewhere if he talked about it.

For a moment, there was only that still silence between them again as Steve’s gaze dropped to the blanket covering Tony, his thick pale lashes casting a dark shadow over his cheeks. He breathed in, slow and steady, like nothing could ever shake him.

But Tony knew better.

Then Steve lifted one trembling hand and placed it over his mouth, as if to hold in his pain. When he finally dropped his hand and looked up, his eyes were glimmering with unshed tears.

“I dream that I taste dirt and ash in my mouth. I dream I taste them in the air when I watch everyone crumble away. That it hurt them, that Bucky asks me to stop the pain and Sam is all alone and in pain… Then— Then I dream that Carol lands with the ship and says, ‘I’m sorry, I was too late.’” Steve’s voice cracked on the last word, like it was a bridge too far.

“Steve…” For once in his life, Tony was at a loss for words beyond that one utterance.

Steve folded over their clasped hands, his loose hair brushing against Tony’s skin. “It’s the same dream. All the time. It’s…better. Now that we have a plan. We’re doing _something_. But I dreamt it again tonight. And no matter how much water I drink, I can’t wash the taste from my mouth. I can’t stop hearing Carol’s voice telling me…”

His voice died away like he had ran out of strength to continue.

Whispering, Tony asked, “Is that why you came here? To see for yourself that I’m still here?”

Steve nodded, never looking up.

Another quiet moment descended over them. Tony only looked at the top of Steve’s head, thinking what a messed up pair they made. They were a truly matched broken set.

And maybe, they were broken in a way that their jagged edges would fit together now, not scraping each other raw, but completing one another to make a whole.

“We need to sleep. We need our strength to keep working,” Tony said quietly.

Steve sighed, almost a soundless exhale, shoulders curled in for the briefest of moments. Then he straightened up and it was like he had pulled on his uniform helmet, his face so wiped of expression it was like staring at a Captain America action figure.

“I’ll head back to my room—”

Tony tightened his hold on Steve’s hand, which cut off his words. Tugging on his grasp, Tony pulled him forward meaningfully. “Maybe it’ll help with the nightmares.”

Never could it be said that Steve was slow on the uptake. His eyes flickered down to the bed and then back up to Tony’s eyes. “You mean…share the bed?”

“We need the sleep, and our nightmares are waking us up. Maybe this will help, where’s the harm?” Tony asked, trying to sound like suggesting two grown men curl up together in a narrow bed for sleep was a completely calm and rationale proposal. “If it doesn’t work, we’ll figure something else out.”

But Tony thought it would help. He couldn’t really articulate why. His tired, depressed brain might have just been deluded to think that way, but he couldn’t deny that for some reason, he felt bone-deep certain that this was the right solution, like a quiet version of arriving at a technological breakthrough.

Steve looked into his eyes, seemed to be searching for something. Whatever it was, he seemed to find it after a long minute holding Tony’s gaze.

“Move over,” Steve said, and that was that.

It was a little awkward at first, because the bed wasn’t very large. But they shuffled and moved, muttered about sharp elbows and cold feet until eventually, they settled into what seemed like the best configuration.

Tony had his back to Steve’s chest, both of them on their sides, but they weren’t pressed up-close. Steve’s knees were touching the back of Tony’s knees, Tony’s hand still gripping Steve’s so that their clasped hands were resting on Tony’s hip. But other than that, there was a polite space between them.

It didn’t matter though. Tony could still feel Steve’s hot breath against the back of his neck, feel the warmth radiating from his body.

His breathing was…comforting. Tony could already feel himself starting to drift off.

“Wake me up…if you have another nightmare,” Tony suggested, knowing his voice sounded a little slurred.

He felt Steve squeeze his hand. “I don’t think that will be a problem.”

“Good,” murmured Tony as he felt sleep tug at his consciousness.

Steve hummed softly, almost sleepily too, and then Tony was out.

\---

When Tony woke up to faint sunlight slanting into the medbay, Steve was still there, deep asleep. But they had both gravitated together, completely changed positions so that the polite space between them was annihilated. Tony was lying on Steve’s chest, enveloped by blankets and Steve’s heavy arm around his shoulder. The slow, steady heartbeat beneath his ear was like the sweetest lullaby, reassuring with its gentle but strong rhythm. The obnoxious snoring was kind of nice as well as yet another sign that Steve wasn’t perfect, and Tony was taking it as future blackmail material.

He knew he should get up, untangle himself from what was no doubt an accidental moment where their bodies just came together like heat-seeking missiles, but instead, he just smiled and closed his eyes. Bruce would probably find the both of them here and they would get the ribbing of their lives. But Tony didn’t care, not with Steve’s heartbeat in his ear, not when surrounded in Steve’s scent and embrace.

He went back to sleep, feeling safe and not alone for the first time in a very long while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please feel free to point out any typos! I was trying to figure out a way to post this whole fic in fewer chapters but I can't seem to get that to work and it felt like too much was happening in each chapter when I consolidated. I really need to stop editing this fic, haha. Anyway, thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter with its dose of h/c! :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rest of the fic is completely beta-read and edited now. There's only a couple spots in the last couple chapters that I'm thinking about tweaking. In short, I think I've mostly got a handle on this fic so I’m going to increase posting frequency to twice a week. I’ll be posting every Sunday/Monday and Wednesday/Thursday. Next chapter will be posted on Wednesday/Thursday if all goes well! :D
> 
> All mistakes are my own, since I always edit again right before I post each chapter. Yes, I have an editing problem...

The day started out well. Everyday should start out with cuddling — because that was what it was, there was no way around it — just to set the right tone. But Tony wasn’t going to think too much on why he had woken up in such a good mood. He wasn’t going to wonder why a night spent with his head pillowed on a certain someone’s firm chest resulted in the best sleep he had experienced in weeks. Maybe even years.

He wasn’t going to spend any more time thinking on how it felt like to wake up in a warm embrace, to sleepy blue eyes watching him and a small smile on soft, pink lips…

Damnit, he was thinking about it. 

He really didn’t have time for this. He had important work to do that he was making almost no progress with. Rubbing his head, Tony sighed. 

Since that trip out to San Francisco, he had graduated from using the wheelchair occasionally to standing on his own two feet for most of the day. Yippee! So now he could stand and walk around and throw himself onto the ground in a tantrum as he failed to solve time travel. 

The room was filled with blue hologram projections as Tony worked on his time travel simulations while Rocket and Bruce worked in the next room on producing a better quantum tunnel. Tony would have preferred Bruce working with him instead, but Rocket needed someone to rein in his excesses and irrepressible urge to troll them using the quantum tunnel, so Bruce had been co-opted into breaking the boundaries of physics _and_ raccoon-babysitting. Tony wasn’t at all jealous that his lab buddy was now sciencing with a furry sentient animal, no siree.

Pulling his mind forcibly away from a cosy morning pressed up against Steve, Tony fiddled with the time travel model projected in front of him, tweaking it using the interface on the flat surface of the table. “I have a mild inspiration, let’s see if it checks out,” he said idly to F.R.I.D.A.Y. “Try the simulation in the shape of a Mobius strip, inverted, please.”

“Processing,” F.R.I.D.A.Y. confirmed.

Tony watched the model spin into place and started tweaking it with his hands before saying, “Give me the eigenvalue of that particle, factoring in spectral decomp.” He sighed. “That will take a second.”

“Just a moment,” F.R.I.D.A.Y. noted.

While Tony wandered over to a side table to get some water, he heard Rocket sniping at Bruce in the other room while Bruce easily deflected Rocket’s ceaseless complaints.

“I’m just saying. You’re not too bad for a less evolved species,” Rocket blithely threw out there as he hammered on something.

“Can I opt out of evolving into a raccoon?” Bruce responded with a touch of snark and distraction.

Rocket grumbled. “I don’t even know what a raccoon is.”

“Something that eats out of our garbage, which I saw you doing just last night,” Bruce sniped back.

The two projects had been ongoing for the last few days, and Tony was well enough to handle working for longer hours without feeling tired or faint. What an achievement, call the press. Except, well, there was no press to call now. The world was still reeling from what happened. All that remained of the press was a ragtag dispersed bunch, either religious fanatics calling this the Rapture come true as a result of a sinful world, or those who were struggling to keep communication channels open to prevent the world from descending into further chaos.

Right, they were back in depressing territory. Tony tried to shake himself out of it, tried not to think about how the world was a mess as a result of their failures while they were potentially chasing pipe dreams here. Pepper and Carol were doing the best they could, trying to keep the world from self-imploding, with Pepper lending tech and manpower where possible and Carol lending miraculous strength and speeds where needed. Carol only came back because of the potential fix they had promised, otherwise she would be out at the ends of the galaxy, with other planets that needed her help more. Should they all be working on rebuilding the world instead of chasing impossible hopes?

If they got the time travel wrong, there was a possibility they would all end up lost in the quantum realm or stuck at some other point in time. Well, maybe it wouldn’t be a great loss to the world if they weren’t in it anymore.

But no, Tony couldn’t give up on the hope that there was a way to reverse all that had happened. He had to believe, because if he didn’t, that meant…

_“I don’t want to go, Mister Stark.”_

And there were countless people across the universe feeling like he did, or even worse.

So he had to believe this would work. No matter how desperate it was and how statistically improbable, he had to make it work.

“Did the holo offend you?” a familiar voice said from too close behind him.

Tony turned his head, now used to Nebula sneaking up on him after their time in a confined space. “I was just…thinking about something else. How are you doing? Haven’t seen you much since our road trip.”

“You were too busy lying in bed and crying,” Nebula said, matter-of-fact.

Wincing, Tony scratched his jaw. “That’s…not inaccurate. I’m almost hurt, you know. Friends deal with each other’s tears and snot, we could have definitely cried on each others’ shoulders.”

He thought Nebula would protest the idea that she ever cried, but instead, she only said, slow and uncertain, “Friends?” She stared at him unblinking, a deep puzzled frown on her face.

“Yes?” Tony ventured, looking at her out of the corner of his eyes. “Friends. It’s not an Earth-only concept, is it?”

“No, but it was not one that applied commonly to me in the past,” Nebula said with a hint of awkwardness.

For a moment, Tony was flummoxed, before he gestured at the open door to the workshop next door where Bruce and Rocket were arguing over some design issue. “That can’t be true. Fuzzy over there is your friend too, right?”

Tilting her head, Nebula stared through the doorway, thinking. She seemed to be giving this idea serious consideration, like it was the first time she ever thought about it this way. Then she nodded slowly. “Yes. Even if he’s an asshole.”

That startled a laugh out of Tony. “Blunt as always. So how are you going with the paper football?” Tony flicked his finger in demonstration. “Getting any practice in?”

“I taught it to Rocket. He hates it,” Nebula said with the faintest hint of smugness.

Tony frowned. “Why?”

Her lips quirked up in a small smile as she said, “Because he always loses to me.”

Grinning, Tony held his hand out in a fist, and gently, she reciprocated his gesture with a fist bump, yet another thing he had taught her while they were stranded in space.

She looked down at her fist and murmured, “Friends,” like it was still a foreign concept. But when she looked up at him, something about her solemn dark eyes told him that she liked the idea. Tony smiled back at her.

“Model rendered,” F.R.I.D.A.Y. announced.

The beautiful inverted Mobius strip cascaded into complete and stable existence.

For a moment, Tony froze, then he tried to shrug it off. “It probably doesn’t even work.”

“Why? It looks like it does,” Nebula contradicted, even as F.R.I.D.A.Y. said, “Simulation is stable.”

Tony gaped at the sight before him, at what he had been trying to achieve but had so little confidence could actually be done.

“Oh, shit,” he said, stumbling back and sinking into the chair behind him.

“What’s wrong, what happened?” And suddenly, Steve was there, as if having been summoned by some alarm only he could hear.

Rhodey was right behind him, carrying a plate full of sandwiches, and it was only then that Tony noticed that Steve had put down a tray full of drinks on the table. Right, they weren’t magically summoned, they were bringing lunch. That made more sense.

“I think I did it,” Tony said, still sounding faint.

“He solved time travel,” Nebula added, again in that matter-of-fact way of hers, like it was no big deal, just a little time travel they were discussing here.

Putting the food down on the table as well, Rhodey gestured at the simulation and said, “That’s it over here? Looks like a fancy skating ramp. Anyway, why are you so surprised? This was your idea, Tony.”

“I wasn’t sure if it would work,” Tony shot back. “Give me a moment to bask in my shock.”

“You told us it would work,” Rhodey pointed out.

“I was…mostly sure it would work,” Tony said. “But now I know it will.”

Steve straightened from where he had crouched down to check on Tony, and he clasped a hand on Tony’s shoulder, squeezing gently. He was grinning. “You cracked time travel. That’s amazing, Tony. I knew you could do it.”

Feeling a little flustered under the attention, Tony waved his hand a little. “I didn’t technically crack time travel. Pym’s reckless use of technology opened up a way for us to use the quantum tunnel for time travel. All I’m creating here is a time travel GPS so we don’t get lost in space-time limbo forever or turn into babies by having time travel through us instead.”

“I’m all for not getting lost in space-time limbo forever or turning into babies,” Steve said with a lopsided smile.

“Hey, does anyone even care that we’ve built a bigger and better quantum tunnel?” Rocket asked, his strident tones breaking the moment as he walked in.

“Tony solved time travel,” Rhodey said, a hint of pride in his voice.

“Whatever, he only created a way to control which point in time we end up in, he didn’t solve time travel. This other dead guy did, even if he had no idea what he was doing,” Rocket replied with a dismissive wave of his paw.

Sighing, Tony stood up. “Nothing like a talking plushie to keep my ego in check.”

“What’s a plushie?” Rocket asked with a furrow of his furry brow.

Nebula said solemnly, “You are,” which cracked Tony up on the inside. He couldn’t laugh aloud because he didn’t want to find out how it felt like to have an alien raccoon bite him in the ankle.

Bruce grinned at them. “This is amazing, guys. So it really works. Now we need to test it.”

“And we need to figure out which point in time we’re going back to,” Natasha said from the open doorway. “And who is going to use it.”

Steve and Tony exchanged looks. Those were very good points, and it reminded Tony of something that Steve clearly realized as well.

“We need to get the team together,” Steve said quietly.

“What? The team is together, we’re all standing here together, like a bunch of douchebags,” Rocket pointed out.

Steve shook his head. “Not all of us.”

He turned to Natasha. She took a deep breath and nodded. “I’ll find him. He’ll come back for this, if he knows there’s hope.”

It was time for the Avengers to assemble.

Rocket muttered under his breath, “I hate this cryptic bullshit.”

\---

While Natasha was on her mission to find Clint, everyone else prepped for the trial run with the time travel GPS. Steve had agreed to go back in time, unwilling to let someone else try out untested, complicated new technology. That had Tony on tenterhooks, trying to suppress thoughts that he might be dooming Steve to an eternity in time limbo if he had gotten the technology wrong. He had tried to argue to go in Steve’s place, but Steve had insisted that Tony wasn’t at full strength yet.

Damn him for using logic on Tony.

While they were prepping Steve in the time-travel suit that Tony had designed, more nanotech that could better handle the stress of traveling through the quantum realm, Rhodey walked into the room and gave a low whistle.

“Time-travel suit not bad,” Rhodey commented as he looked over Steve’s red, white and gray nanosuit that Tony had created just for this.

“Because I designed it,” Tony said, unrepentantly smug even as Rhodey rolled his eyes.

Steve looked up with a flicker of a smile as he let Bruce adjust the outfit and slot the Pym particles into the right compartment.

“Hey, hey, hey, easy, easy!” Scott said, hovering beside Nebula who was examining the suit on Steve’s other side. He had been too shaky to be part of the test run, which was why Steve had put his hand up for it of course. There wasn’t a test grenade that Steve didn’t find attractive.

“I’m being very careful,” Bruce said, clearly trying to suppress an eyeroll.

Scott flailed, hands waving in the air. “Not careful enough! Ever since Hank Pym got snapped out of existence, this is it; these Pym particles are all we have. We’re not making any more.” He emphasized by pointing a finger at Bruce, almost getting up in his face over it.

Oh boy, Scott was losing it. Rocket, who was sitting on a workstation swinging his legs, shook his head at all this.

Lifting his hands, Rhodey said in as soothing a tone as possible, “Scott, calm down.”

Scott stepped back and visibly forced his body to relax. “Sorry… It’s just… We’ve got enough for one round trip each. That’s it, no do-overs.”

“Plus, two test runs,” Steve pointed out, unfazed, calm, the perfect candidate for experimental science. It wasn’t like this was his first go-round at it.

“That’s more than enough Pym particles for us to fix things, don’t be such a whiny baby about it,” Rocket directed at Scott, which got Scott all worked up again.

Ignoring the dramatics around her, Nebula started tapping into the holographic keyboard over Steve’s shoulder, tweaking the suit further to better handle the travel through time and space.

Rhodey wandered over to where Bruce was standing and asked, “If we can do this, go back in time, why don’t we just find baby Thanos, you know, and…” He mimed wrapping something around a small neck and pulled tight on the ends of his imaginary garrote.

Bruce’s horror was written all over his face, and he stared at Rhodey, aghast. “First of all…that’s _horrible_.”

“It’s _Thanos_ ,” Rhodey replied with an eye-roll.

Tony couldn’t help but snicker, and he could see Steve trying to hide a grin of his own at this Rhodey and Bruce show.

“Secondly, time doesn’t work that way,” Bruce continued over Rhodey. 

Scott frowned, stopping his sniping with Rocket to pay attention to this conversation instead. “Look, maybe we don’t do that baby Thanos killing part, but we go back and get the Stones before Thanos gets them. Thanos doesn’t get the Stones. Problem solved.”

Nebula hissed in annoyance. “That’s not how it works.”

“You gotta explain it to them slowly, with very small words,” Rocket interjected because he was an asshole.

“But that’s how everyone says it works,” Scott said with frustration.

“Who? Who told you that?” Bruce demanded, exasperated.

Rhodey started listing movies off his fingers. “Star Trek, Terminator, Time Cop, Time after Time, Wrinkle in Time, Somewhere in Time, Hot Tub Time Machine—”

From between their bickering teammates, Steve raised his eyebrows and gave Tony a look. Tony grinned, because he was having a pretty good time enjoying this short bout of live entertainment. But knowing how many movies Rhodey watched, they could be here all day if he went unchecked. Tony hated being the one to check Rhodey for doing anything, but duty called.

“Come on, Salamander, that’s really not how time travel works,” Tony finally spoke up, putting an arm over Rhodey’s shoulder. 

Bruce jumped in, explaining passionately, “Think about it. If you travel to the past, that past becomes your future. And your former present becomes the past, which can’t now be changed by your new future.”

Nebula sniffed. “Exactly.”

Tony had to stifle a laugh because that was probably the most confusing way Bruce could have picked to explain time travel.

Always feeling the need to back Rhodey’s play, Tony pondered aloud, “While we wouldn’t be changing our present timeline, I admit…offing baby Thanos would probably be kind of cathartic.”

“I don’t think you would be able to kill a baby, even if it was baby Thanos,” Steve said thoughtfully, because he could be such an asshole sometimes. 

“We could so kill baby Thanos. I can’t believe you have so little faith in our baby-killing potential,” Tony protested, giving Rhodey an ‘amirite?’ look and Rhodey shook his head in solemn disapproval at Steve’s total lack of faith.

Bruce said despairingly, “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.”

“And I still can’t believe Natasha had to go off to get whoever that arrowguy is,” Rocket complained right over their conversation, resulting in collective groans around the room. It was the same complaint he had been singing for the past day. Tony suspected Rocket had a crush on Natasha, and to be fair, that was understandable. It was Natasha.

“We’ve already explained it. He’s part of our team,” Rhodey pointed out. “We need to at least let him know what we’re going to try.”

Rocket replied, “Yeah, but he’s going to want to come along and we don’t have enough Pym particles. Who’s gonna sit out the time traveling mission? Any one of us? Or you want to tell Carol she came back to Earth for nothing?”

Bruce shrugged. “You’re right about that.” He raised a hand when he saw that Steve was going to protest. “I don’t mean that we shouldn’t find Clint before we go. We should. If something goes wrong, Clint deserves to know what we had planned. But we definitely don’t have enough Pym particles for everyone to go. We knew that already though, so this isn’t new bad news. It’s known bad news.”

“That Rocket can’t stop harping on about,” Nebula grumbled.

“But he does have a point. In a situation like this, the more people we can bring, the better,” Rhodey agreed with a frown. “We’re time traveling. Who knows how many times we might need to try to get it right.”

Now that was a daunting idea, that they would mess up so bad that they had to do a few time-traveling loops to fix things. How many alternate realities were they willing to create to achieve their goal?

“Hold up,” Steve said, having his thinking face on. It was a very hot face, not that Tony dwelled on such matters at all. No more than twice a day, tops. “We’re doing a trial run, right? Which means we have to go back in time anyway. And you’re all sure that we’re going to create alternate realities instead of changing our own past?”

“Yes?” Bruce said, sounding a little uncertain at the sudden barrage of questions.

“Yes,” Tony said, feeling a tingle in his spine at the look on Steve’s face, the hint that a plan was coming into place and it was going to be a doozy.

Steve turned to Scott. “And these Pym particles, they belong to Hank Pym. And he usually has a lot more than these few vials?”

Light was starting to dawn in Scott’s eyes, but he shook his head. “Yes, but you don’t know Hank. He’s very paranoid and he keeps everything miniaturized. He’s constantly moving and hiding. It’s not going to be easy for you to get your hands on them.”

Looking a little disappointed but still determined, Steve pressed on, “Are you sure you can’t think of a way we can get more from the past?”

Scott already looked downcast, but before he could answer, Tony jumped in.

“I know a time when Hank Pym was less paranoid and he was in one location for a significant amount of time, which we have a chance of actually getting into,” Tony interjected, feeling excitement in his veins.

“Where, Tony?” Steve asked, looking hopeful again and his voice echoing Tony’s excitement.

“Camp Lehigh,” Tony said. “And I’m coming with you.”

Bruce waved his hands at them. “Guys, this is supposed to be a trial run!”

“A trial run that involves going back in time _anyway_. And we have enough for two people to do the trial runs,” Tony said. “We might as well make the most out of it and actually bring something back with us. There’s also a better chance of fixing things if something goes wrong, because there’ll be people on both ends who know what they’re doing with time travel.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing with time travel!” Bruce protested.

“Eh, we know enough, stop worrying so much,” Rocket disagreed with a careless wave, hopping off his perch to stand beside Rhodey instead.

Scott tried to cut in. “But what are you—”

“See, nothing to worry about,” Tony continued, ignoring Bruce’s and Scott’s spluttering complaints to turn to Steve. “And if I’m going with you, Steve, you don’t have to worry that I’m not at full strength yet.”

Nodding slowly, Steve seemed like he fully onboard. “It could work and it would definitely help the mission if we had more Pym particles.”

“Captain. Steve,” Scott interjected, then winced at his own awkwardness. “Sorry, America. Rogers.” Tony could see when he gave up and just ploughed on. “Look, this sounds like a longer trip than what we planned for a test run. There’s a higher chance it’s going to go wrong, and if you do this, and this doesn't work, you might both get stuck in the past, or in the quantum realm.”

It was a valid point, but they had played longer odds before.

Tony met Steve’s gaze and asked, “You trust me?”

Clear blue eyes were filled only with confidence and belief when Steve replied, “I do.”

A warmth filled Tony’s stomach. Trust went both ways, and in the past, they had both lacked trust in each other. But now, things were different; he could feel it.

Rocket’s annoyed voice broke through his thoughts. “Can someone tell me what’s going on? Where’s Camp Lehigh? What’s over there?”

Nudging him with a knee, Rhodey mumbled, “They’ll get around to explaining themselves when they stop exchanging mooning calf-eyed looks at each other.”

“If only they would speed it up a little,” Rocket grumbled, even as he elbowed Rhodey back in the knee.

Tony manfully pretended he didn’t hear that, and from Steve’s faintly red cheeks, he was doing the same.

Rolling his eyes, Tony turned to everyone else and said, “What we’re going to do is go on a time-traveling, undercover, infiltration heist. Any questions?”

There were many, _many_ questions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so much fun writing the interaction between all these different characters, especially when it comes to Rocket, Nebula and Rhodey. Anyway, next chapter is going to feature time travel shenanigans! It will go very differently to what happened in the movie. ;)
> 
> Don’t forget that I’ll be posting Chapter 4 on Wed/Thurs!


	4. Chapter 4

It was the end of the world as they knew it, and they were resorting to truly experimental and dangerous technology. Tony knew this was serious, knew that times were desperate and dark.

But he couldn’t help his thrill of amazement and awe that his time travel GPS had worked. It had fucking worked! And here he was, standing around in the 1970s with Steve, the two of them against the world, like they were back on a mission where they knew they could rely on each other. It was familiar and long missed after two years apart since the horror show in Siberia.

Tony felt guilty for feeling this way when so much was at risk, but he couldn’t deny his excitement and pleasure when he looked at Steve and saw him looking right back with a smile of his own.

They had done it. They had cracked time travel, and now, they were on their way to do what they usually did best—pull off some crazy impossible feat.

Knowing ahead of time where and when they were going, Tony had programmed the decade-appropriate clothing into the quantum suits. They were nanotech, so with just a flick of a button, they rippled from the white, red and gray of the quantum suits to an army uniform for Steve and a suit jacket for Tony, cut to match the time period.

Steve made a rather distracting figure in dress greens, and Tony tried to keep his eyes trained ahead instead of focused on Steve’s form. Now was a bad time for his uniform kink to be rearing its head.

Trying to ignore how well Steve’s shoulders filled out that shirt, like the outfit had been sewn onto him, Tony peeked through windows as they walked through Camp Lehigh. “Imagine you’re SHIELD, running a quasi-fascistic intelligence organization. Where do you hide your top secret projects?”

“In plain sight,” Steve said, nodding at a small building that didn’t look any different to the other squat buildings, but there were two men at its doorstep, looking around conspicuously before stepping through a door that had a passcode lock on it.

Tony tapped his glasses and watched as it provided a scanned internal image of the building. It had an elevator shaft that went far below underground than would be expected for a building of that size. Bingo.

It was a work of a few seconds to figure out the passcode using the tech in Tony’s suit, and they managed to slip into the lift without any commotion. But they also ended up in the same lift as a very small woman with poofy hair who kept shooting them suspicious looks. They tried hard to pretend not to notice that she had very likely made their cover. When they stepped out of the lift, Steve glanced back.

“Damnit, she’s flagging down a soldier and pointing at us. We’ve been made,” Steve hissed under his breath.

Tony swore and tugged on Steve’s elbow, pulling him round the corner and down a corridor. But Steve was the one giving him instructions under his breath, “Walk fast, but don’t run. Act like we belong here but we’ve got somewhere urgent to get to.”

“Advice from Nat?” Tony asked under his breath.

Steve only nodded as they walked at a brisk pace, taking a few more turnings to get out of sight as quickly as possible. When Steve’s sharper hearing caught the sound of raised voices, Tony pointed out what looked to be a supply room and headed straight for it. He turned the doorknob only to find it was locked. Nudging him aside, Steve turned the doorknob hard enough to break the lock, and then they were both scrambling in right quick. It turned out to be more like a small supply closet rather than an actual room, but they both squeezed in anyway.

Once the door was pulled shut behind them, Tony touched his glasses to turn on the night vision function. He was pressed up against Steve’s side and there wasn’t much room to manoeuvre, but he didn’t have time to dwell on that. Grabbing some cloth and a long broom stick while bumping into Steve a few times along the way, Tony used all of it jerry rig a quick contraption around the doorknob.

“If anyone tries to open it from the outside, it’ll hold and feel like it’s locked,” Tony whispered, turning and finally taking in their situation.

With Tony’s glasses on, he could see Steve clearly. He could see wide eyes as Steve tried to see in the almost complete darkness of what amounted to be a broom closet, could see Steve’s chest rise with surprising speed like he had been running, when they really hadn’t.

Frowning, Tony tried to reassure him. “We’re going to be okay. I don’t think they’ll catch us.”

There was a short moment of quiet before Steve responded, “I’m not worried about that.”

Tony tried to shift back, to better see the entirety of Steve’s face, but there just wasn’t any room to shift when he was in a tiny closet with a rather muscular supersoldier. Then he realized that Steve probably couldn’t see a damn thing in the closet, which was probably disturbing for him. Although… Could he really not see anything?

“How much can you see in the dark?” Tony asked in a soft undertone, giving in to his curiosity but not wanting to get caught chatting. “I just realized we never tested your supersoldier eyes. Are they enhanced as well—”

Steve cut in, “I can see the outline of your face, the shape of your jaw. I can see…your eyes. Not clearly, but I can see them. And…your eyelashes.”

It felt strangely confessional, like Steve was admitting to something sinful. Tony felt a shiver run down his back, but he couldn’t even figure out a reason for reacting that way.

“That’s pretty amazing,” Tony said with raised eyebrows, even though Steve might not be able to see them.

“I’m not sure if that’s to do with the superserum. My night vision was always pretty good, even if everything else wasn’t,” Steve said with a self-deprecating shrug.

“Yeah, everything else was just crap, like your persistence, plucky attitude and heart of gold. Nothing good at all,” Tony said with heavy sarcasm, shifting and feeling his knee brush against Steve’s leg, so he forced himself to stay still. He tried to move the topic on. “We really should have done tests on whether your eyesight is within normal human range, or whether the superserum did give it a boost.”

Steve huffed, seeming like he was trying to cross his arms, but that only led to his hand dragging up Tony’s side, which caused him to drop his arms down instead. He started again, “I’m not signing up to be your lab rat, Tony.”

Grinning, Tony asked with a flutter of his lashes, not that he was sure Steve could see that clearly. “Not even if I ask nicely?”

“Well…depends on how you ask.”

“How do you want me to ask?” Tony shot back, voice dropping low and warm without thought.

He watched, entranced, as Steve’s tongue darted out to wet his lips. “I’m sure you can come up with something.”

Tony felt the back of his own neck heat for some inexplicable reason and he tried to change the topic all of a sudden, “What’s wrong? Your breathing is getting short. Are you worried we’ll get caught? Cause the door is pretty secure.”

“That’s not worry,” Steve murmured.

Tony was suddenly acutely aware that Steve’s chest was almost pressed up against his own, that he thought Steve’s breath was getting short because he could feel the slight heave of his body due to how close they were standing. It was enough to make Tony’s skin suddenly break out in goosepimples, to cause his heart to trip.

“I can feel your breath on me,” Steve whispered, and suddenly, Tony could feel the same as well. It was Steve’s warm breath from his parted lips, and it felt unbearably intimate.

Tony opened his mouth to say something, anything, to deflect, but he never got the chance.

Suddenly, Steve closed the small distance between them and his face was right in front of Tony’s and his mouth was _right there_ and...

They were _kissing_.

Tony’s unspoken words turned into a gasp, an exhalation that Steve drank up. He felt fingers on his cheek, cupping him firm and warm, tilting his head until their mouths lined up, until Tony found his lips moving, kissing back with a startling ferocity. He never expected it to be like this... Not that he usually allowed his imagination to stray here except for during very rare indulgent fantasies, but he never expected their first kiss to be so heavy, laden with meaning and emotions.

They were pressed up so close together, with nothing tentative about the way they were kissing for the first time ever. Steve’s tongue swept into his mouth like he was dying from thirst and he could only find salvation in Tony’s body, Tony opened to his kisses like a struggling flower turning to the sun with joy. It was messy, frantic and _perfect_. Tony let out a soft groan as Steve’s hand slipped under the front collar of his shirt, fingers pressing against the bare skin of Tony’s collarbone. He repaid the move by tangling his hand in Steve’s hair, tugging until he felt a moan against his lips, felt Steve press forward in a hot urgent line even though there was nowhere else to go.

The rattling of the cupboard’s door frame shook straight through them, sending them into a frozen clinch.

“It’s still locked,” a gruff voice called from outside.

“Yeah, the janitor always keeps it locked. They ain’t gonna be in there,” someone further away called out. “Keep searching. They might have gone to the sub-basements, that’s where the good stuff are.”

They remained frozen in each other’s arms, hardly daring to breathe, not making any sudden moves beyond breaking off from their passionate kiss. It was awkward, standing motionless while still sharing breaths, still holding each other. Tony’s eyes flickered down and he saw Steve lick his lips again, like he could taste Tony on his own mouth.

They had kissed. What the fuck, they had _kissed_.

Tony pulled away, as far as he could in a tiny supply closet like this, and Steve let him go, although he didn’t think he imagined the reluctance in Steve’s hands when pulling away.

“What just happened?” Tony hissed, when the searching voices had faded away.

“When a fella likes another fella…” Steve said with a fair bit of sarcasm.

“That’s not what I—” Tony swerved. “When did you even like me?”

Steve gave him a distinctly unimpressed look, which was impressive delivery in a near dark closet. “Do you really think that, Tony?”

Okay, that…was a valid point. While they had their rough moments, some being _very_ rough by anyone’s standards, it was hard to imagine that Captain Brutal Honesty would spend any amount of time with Tony if he genuinely didn’t like him. Tony was just clutching at old habits here.

“Liking doesn’t mean—” Tony paused to gesture frantically at both their faces before continuing in a heated whisper, “This! _Kissing_. Since when did you want to kiss me?”

“You kissed me back,” Steve whispered back with that stubborn set to his jaw.

“Yes, but, that wasn’t my question! Since when did you even like me like this?” Tony persisted, his brain seeming to be stuck on a loop, mentally replaying the kiss over and over again in stunned confusion.

Steve sighed, shaking his head. “Is it really such a surprise, Tony? Even after we shared a bed together and ended up holding each other?”

Okay, that kissing loop playing in Tony’s head was now stalled out by the words ' _holding each other_ ' falling out of Steve’s mouth in relation to the two of them. He couldn’t believe how casually Steve said that. Didn’t he realize how ridiculous that was? It was Steve and Tony. They hadn’t been holding each other; they had been sharing a bed and accidentally sleep-cuddling. That was all it was, totally innocent sleep-cuddling between two guys where one guy occasionally fantasized about the other guy.

That sounded weird even in Tony’s own head so he tried to put a kibosh to those confusing frantic thoughts.

Verbally, he scrambled for an explanation. “It was just bed-sharing to keep away nightmares.”

“Was it?” Steve asked mulishly.

Tony gaped at him. Okay, yes, they kind of cuddled. And _yes_ , Tony might have gone back to sleep on Steve’s chest, listening to his heartbeat, instead of pulling away like how most platonic buddies would do. But…it hadn’t been anything more than just seeking comfort in the nearest warm body, especially from Steve’s end.

Right?

Although…he couldn’t imagine doing the same thing with most of everyone else he knew.

In the short silence, Steve wilted a little from his stiff-backed stubbornness and said, “Alright, you’re not wrong. I’ve shared bunks with other soldiers when there wasn’t room or when our nightmares were keeping us awake. But it was different with you. It…felt like more. Everything always feels _more_ when it’s the two of us. Or maybe that’s just on me. I’ve wanted it to be more for years now.” Steve let out a frustrated huff, running his hand through his hair roughly before continuing in a tense, low tone. “So tell me if I’m wrong. Tell me if you don’t feel the same way and tell me to just stop, that it’s all in my head. I’ll apologize and never bring this up again. But tell me the truth, Tony.”

Tony was bowled over by the intensity in Steve’s voice, by the sheer courage he displayed with the open confession. Mouth flapping uselessly for awhile, Tony finally managed, “I never knew you felt that way.”

“I always wondered if you knew,” Steve said with a shake of his head. “Everyone else seemed to have me pegged from the start. Nat said if I had run any faster to you when Carol brought you back, I would have broken light speed.”

Tony tried to remember that moment when he had been so mired in pain and exhaustion, a hazy time when he had been numb with horror at what they had lost. He knew Steve was the first there, but he couldn’t remember when everyone else reached them. He knew Steve had held him up, helped him walk, and that he had turned to Steve with only thoughts that Steve was here, Steve was here and everything was better when Steve was here, even when things were at their worst.

Maybe Tony’s long-repressed feelings weren’t that repressed after all.

“Tony…” Steve whispered, a look of desperation gleaming dark through Tony’s night vision lenses. He looked like he was braced for the worst. “Just tell me.”

And Tony couldn’t lie. Not in this moment.

They had already lost almost everything. They might still lose the rest today, tomorrow, when their full plans were set in motion. There was no time and space left for lies between them.

“You’re not wrong,” Tony whispered, before gripping Steve by his stupid-hot military uniform and yanking him in for a hard kiss. He pulled away from Steve’s stunned face for a second to continue, “I just never thought I could have this.”

Then they were kissing again, both coming together with desperate, long-suppressed passion.

\---

If they had more time, they would probably have gotten each other off in the closet. They had to force themselves apart when it sounded mostly quiet outside. Steve kept caressing Tony’s cheek, ears, neck, shoulders, like he couldn’t believe he could have this, which led to more kissing and more groping. Tony’s mouth kept falling back onto Steve’s lips, jawline, neck, ears, back to his lips, like he needed to memorize how every part of Steve felt like to his mouth. It took pure strength of will to finally step apart, to try to slow their breathing, to will away arousals.

They took some time to straighten up, to try to look presentable again by flattening mussed up hair and doing up all their buttons. Exchanging heated looks with Steve, silently promising a continuation, Tony had just undid his handiwork holding the door shut and was about to open it when Steve laid a restraining hand on Tony’s wrist.

“A couple people are coming,” Steve whispered.

Tony held still, tense, hand on the doorknob to try to hold it unmoving if someone tried it.

From outside, he heard an almost familiar voice saying, “I don’t have time for this nonsense. My very pregnant wife is going to kill me if I’m late again today.”

Another voice responded, “Sir, we just need you to assess if anything was taken from Sub-Basement One, then you can be off for the day.”

“The security here is garbage for a so-called secret facility. Do you let just about anyone walk in?” came the scathing reply.

The voices and their corresponding footsteps faded as they rounded the corner and walked further away.

That…that couldn’t have been… Tony made some mental calculations. Pregnant wife? The timing lined up.

Steve was looking at him with wide eyes as well, clearly recognizing that voice too.

They didn’t have time for this. Shaking his head, Tony said, “We aren’t talking about this again.”

After a couple awkward seconds, Steve shrugged. “Talk about what?”

“Good man,” Tony murmured, and opened the door to an empty corridor.

Finding Hank Pym’s lab hadn’t been hard. Steve’s impression of someone from the delivery room who had opened up Pym’s parcels and was now panicking at the results was hilarious and worked perfectly. They ducked right into the lab once Pym dashed out in a panic.

“What have we got here,” Tony murmured, surveying the lab.

Steve was already looking around, checking the tables, before he said, “Here, I got them.”

“How many vials?” Tony asked. There were tanks of ants, test tubes, clunky measurement machinery, more ants, filing cabinets…ah, there it was.

“Twelve. That’s not bad, but I was hoping for more,” Steve said, moving to store the vials away in the briefcase that they had brought along. “What are you doing over there?”

“Getting more,” Tony explained in an absent-minded way.

A couple minutes later, Steve was by his side with the particles stored away in his briefcase, looking a little confused. “You found more vials?”

“Nope. I found something better,” Tony said, gesturing in front of him.

Steve frowned. “Why are you digging through his filing cabinets?”

“Stealing his research,” Tony said casually. “If we can’t carry back a truckload of Pym particles, we could make our own instead. Here we go, I think this is it.”

“That’s…genius,” Steve said, admiringly. Then he frowned when he looked at Pym’s cluttered desk. “Wouldn’t his research be in this computer?” Steve asked, gesturing uncertainly at the large blocky tech with an ugly keyboard in front of it.

Tony was shaking his head even as he started to pass stacks of folders to Steve. “No, the computers of this decade were like prehistoric dinosaurs with none of the cool roaring. Most of them lose data once you turn them off, and anything that can possibly be stored is kept on tapes or exorbitantly expensive disks. Both can store very little data, so I doubt he has most of his research there.”

Flipping through the thick binder he had in hand, Tony let his glasses get a good view of every page. “It’s in code but I’m pretty sure it all starts here.”

“Can you decode it?” Steve asked, concern in his voice.

“If it was Pym’s encryption in 2018, probably not. But Pym’s encryption from the 70s? It’s easy; it just takes time we don’t have right now, so I’m just going to scan them and decipher them later.”

“Are we going to have enough time to scan them all?” Steve asked.

“I’ll be done in five minutes, we only need to get these six folders. The rest that you’re holding are probably Pym’s decoys,” Tony said.

“So why am I still holding them?”

Good question.

“Because you look good doing so?” Tony tried.

Steve rolled his eyes and dumped the folders on a nearby table. “I’ll go keep watch. Try to hurry.”

“Yes, Captain, Sir,” Tony said crisply. He would have saluted too but his hands were full.

A tense five minutes passed and then Tony was stuffing all the folders back into the cabinet.

“Time to go, pretty boy,” Tony called out. “We’ve got everything we need.”

Steve walked around the desk to him, his cheeks slightly flushed. Huh. Pretty boy, right. Tony smirked and Steve just rolled his eyes, but the little smile on his lips gave him away.

“Together?” Steve asked, holding up his vial of Pym particles, the briefcase held in his other hand.

“Call it, Cap,” Tony said as he prepared his own vial too.

“Now,” Steve said, and they were jerked through time once more, undergoing the stomach-churning trip back to their present.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was so fun including the 'stuck in the closet' trope in this story haha! And the feelings are out, yaayy!


	5. Chapter 5

So they solved time travel. And they had proven that it worked, and got their hands on more of the resources that made it work.

All that was apparently the easy part.

Steve and Tony had crashed into the same bed that night, too tired to do anything more than hold each other. Hold each other for real, none of that platonic sleep-cuddling crap that Tony tried to pretend that it was in the past. The next day after the time-traveling shenanigans, they had walked into the kitchen to find Clint and Natasha having breakfast, pressed almost shoulder to shoulder. Their eyes were red, their hair and clothing dishevelled, like they had spent the night crying instead of sleeping.

Looking up through shadowed eyes, his face haggard in a way that made him look a decade older, Clint had only asked, “You think this will work?”

Tony had wanted to say, “We’re going up against pretty crazy odds” or “It’s fucking time travel, anything can go wrong.”

But Clint was an Avenger. He knew what the odds were every time they did something outrageous like this. He hadn’t asked because he wanted to know how desperate a measure this was, he already knew all that.

So Tony had only said, “Yeah, it’s going to work.”

And Steve had clasped Clint’s shoulder, giving it that reassuring squeeze only Captain America could deliver perfectly. He had said with conviction, “It’ll work, Clint.”

That had been that.

In Wakanda, there were scientists who were trying to reproduce the Pym particles based on Hank Pym’s notes, which were apparently missing major chunks of his process, that paranoid bastard. Rocket had joined them, because in his own words, ‘reverse engineering shit is my specialty’.

Which left the original Avengers and a few newbies with the hardest part: History lessons.

They were retracing where the Infinity Stones had been over large sections of time, to better decide the exact time they should travel to in their goal to collect all the Infinity Stones. Thor got teary _a lot_ when he covered the Power Stone and the Reality Stone. Things sounded kind of worrying when Nebula told them where to get the Soul Stone, something about how it was at the dominion of death, at the very center of Celestial existence. That sounded…hinky. They vaguely knew where the Space Stone and Mind Stone were at several points in the past, which just left the Time Stone.

Natasha’s notebook was pretty full at this point, and her scribbles involving all the Infinity Stones were getting more intense the longer they puzzled it out. Bruce, Natasha and Tony were all lying down in the conference room, the only ones still bashing their heads at this while everyone had cleverly fled the scene. Tony and Natasha had decided the conference table would make for a good temporary bed, while Bruce was stretched out flat across three chairs.

“That Time Stone guy…” Natasha said, trying to get them back on track.

“Ugh, Doctor Strange,” Bruce muttered as he wiped his glasses, clearly not a fan of magic either. Tony knew he could count on his science bro to share his distaste.

Natasha asked curiously, “What kind of doctor was he?”

Tony mumbled, “Neurostuff meets rabbit from a hat. Nice place in the village, though.”

He sighed, ready to close his eyes against all of this, how they seemed to be endlessly going in circles. He felt a hand on his knee and looked up to see Steve by the table, offering him a pillow. It was kind of sweet that Steve remembered how Tony preferred to sleep—with a pillow tucked between his knees. Sweet and kind of embarrassing, but Tony took the pillow and placed it between his knees, not looking at Natasha or Bruce the entire time.

“What, I don’t get one?” Natasha asked in a drawl.

Steve shrugged as he sat down by the table. “You don’t use one.” He propped his elbow on Tony’s thigh, showing no hint of hesitation at initiating the casual physical contact.

“I do,” Bruce piped up, because he could be a pain in the ass some days.

Steve replied drily, “I’ll note that down for next time, Doctor Banner.”

“Alright, back on topic here,” Tony interrupted from where he was stretched out on the table. “What was the topic?”

“Where was his place?” Natasha asked, picking up the dropped strand of conversation.

Tony tried to think. He hadn’t actually gone to Strange’s place by car, only by mystical golden circles floating in the air.

“Sullivan Street meets Bleecker, I think,” Bruce responded. Good thing Bruce had such a good sense of direction.

“Wait, he lived in New York?” Natasha asked, sounding perplexed.

“No, he lived in Toronto,” Tony said snarkily. “Were you listening to anything?”

But Natasha bowled on ahead, “Guys, if you pick the right year, there are three Stones in New York, so we don’t even need to do that much time traveling, we could all go back together and collect them one Stone at a time.”

Bruce sat upright, staring at her. “Shut the front door.”

“What are you, ninety?” Tony laughed, craning his head to look at Bruce.

“Nah, that’s your boyfriend,” Bruce retorted with a grin.

Steve’s cheeks were a little red, but he only said, “Back in my day, kids used to show their elders respect.”

Tony wanted to pinch his cheeks, but Natasha was already getting up, elbowing him in the back on her way upright. Damn those assassin elbows.

“That’s the last one then,” Natasha said, picking up her notebook from the desk and scribbling furiously into it. She lifted up her book which showed a table spanning a couple pages covering where each Stone was over the years.

“That’s nice work, Nat,” Steve said, looking closely at the pages. “Do you mind?”

She handed the book over into his outstretched hand. He laid it flat on the table, in the space between Tony’s torso and the edge of the table. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., could you scan this and project it please?”

Blue lines swept over the notebook and within seconds, a digitized version of Natasha’s table was projected on the wall.

“So we know when to get each of the Stones.” Clint’s voice came from the doorway.

Tony sat up in time to see Clint and Thor walk into the room, as if telepathically sensing their breakthrough.

“When can we go?” Thor asked, face set in grim, determined lines.

“Hold on, Thor, we’ll still need to plan how we want to do this. We’ll each need to time travel three times at least or we’ll need to split into three teams,” Bruce explained.

Remaining seated on the table, Tony moved so that his legs hung off the edge, getting a better view of the projected timeline of the Stones.

Suddenly, Steve spoke up, “What if we didn’t need three teams or to time travel three times.”

Bruce scratched his head, getting up from the floor to walk over to the projection. “But there are three different points in time, over here, here and here, which have the Stones.” He gestured at the Space Stone, Mind Stone, and Time Stone in 2012, then at the Power Stone and Soul Stone in 2014, and the Reality Stone in 2013. “I don't see how we have any other choice.” 

Shaking his head, Steve said, “Extend out the timeline, F.R.I.D.A.Y. To present day.”

Tony felt his blood thrumming, knowing Steve was having an epiphany of some sort. “What are you thinking, Steve?”

As the table with its six columns extended, Steve turned to them and said, “We’ve tried this before. We tried to get all the Infinity Stones from Thanos, but we were too late because he destroyed them. But being too late isn’t an issue anymore. What if we went earlier this time?”

At the end of the table projected by F.R.I.D.A.Y., each Infinity Stone had the same name and the same date next to them; Thanos and the date of two months ago. They were all in the same space at the same time.

“Go to the retirement planet,” Tony said, with a hint of awe in his voice. “Let Thanos collect the Stones, and get them all from him. Steve, you’re a _genius_.”

Steve’s fair cheeks flushed a little, but he rallied. “It’ll be less dangerous, and we can guess pretty accurately what happens on that planet.”

“You couldn’t have come up with this earlier, Steve, before we spent the last two days figuring out where every Stone was for the past decade?” Natasha asked, but the smirk on her lips belied her words, and she looked excited at this new idea as well.

Rubbing the back of his neck, Steve looked a little sheepish. “Sorry, it didn’t occur to me until I saw the timelines all drawn up. I probably wouldn’t have thought of it if it hadn’t been for your notes.”

“But we would be going up against Thanos who has the full gauntlet and the Stones,” Bruce cut in. “If he uses the Stones again, he could turn us to dust before we move.”

Tony stared at the glowing blue lines in the air, tracing them forwards and backwards in time, noting down when and where the Stones were from point to point. He thought about how Thanos had obtained each Stone…

“He won’t be expecting us. And this time, he’ll be one person against our whole team working together,” Steve said with conviction.

“We can do this, we know what to expect now,” Thor said, voice carrying an undercurrent of urgency, eager to go take his revenge immediately.

Clint suggested, “Maybe we can travel back in time, go see what he does and where he is on the planet, and then travel back again to wait in the best place to ambush him.”

“That’s…actually pretty genius,” Natasha said, sitting cross-legged on the table now.

Rolling his eyes, Clint said, “I’m not just a pretty face you know.”

Thor asked, “When shall we do this?”

“Are we rushing this a little?” Bruce asked, uncertain.

“Tony, why have you gone silent?” Natasha, ever the observant one, asked in a worried tone that had everyone turning to stare at Tony.

Damn, he wasn’t ready yet. The thoughts were still churning in his head.

“You’ve a different plan,” Steve stated, not even a question.

Tony denied instinctively, “I didn’t say that.”

Coming forward to where Tony was sitting on the table, Steve stopped close enough for his legs to brush against Tony’s bent knees. He said in a quiet voice, “You didn’t, but you have one anyway.”

Steve’s tone and gaze wasn’t accusatory, just calm, with a hint of amusement. Like he should have known Tony was going to throw a wrench in his plans. Well, if Steve was open to hearing some bad ideas…

Tony tapped his fingers against his thighs, thinking, before saying a little slower than usual as he tried to keep track of the threads, “There’s another point in time when we have most of the Stones in one place. We don’t even need to go back in time, see what’s going on with Thanos, and then go back in time again. We have videos and recordings from many angles of what happens where, with who and when.”

The frown on Steve’s forehead suddenly eased up as he blinked with amazement. “You’re talking about the Wakandan battlefield, when Thanos shows up with most of the Stones. Most of us were there and you have all the videos that the Wakandans sent over.”

“Yep,” Tony said, popping his ‘p’s, trying to sound flippant. “I’ve watched a lot of those videos, I know how extensive they are and how clearly you can track Thanos throughout.”

“Is there a reason we should do it this way? It’s an option, but is it a better one?” Natasha asked carefully.

Staring unseeing at the projection, Tony asked, “Do you all remember how Thanos gets the Mind Stone?”

They fell silent at that. Tony hadn’t been there on the battlefield, but he had rewatched that scene a dozen times over, not wanting to believe it, unable to stop watching as self-punishment. Vision hadn’t turned to dust; he had died long before Thanos had snapped his fingers, when the Stone had been ripped from his head. Vision, with his naïve curiosity, his echo of sarcasm, who looked at Tony sometimes with fond familiarity, with traces of J.A.R.V.I.S. in him.

Touching the back of Tony’s hand as if to draw his attention back out of that dark pit, Steve pointed out, “You said we can’t change our past. We’ll just be creating an alternate timeline. Our Vision will still be gone.”

“Yes, true, but we’re creating another alternate timeline anyway,” Tony pointed out. “So why not create one where this Vision lives?”

“Wait, how are we creating an alternate timeline with the first option?” Clint asked, confusion clear in his voice.

Tony explained, hands moving in the air for emphasis, “Let’s say we go to the retirement planet, kill Thanos and get the Stones. When the Avengers of that timeline go to find Thanos, they’ll only find his body _and_ the Stones, once we return them after we’re done with them. It’s already going to be different to what happened to us.”

“So we have done the hard work for this alternate timeline, what does it matter?” Thor asked, sounding impatient.

Shaking his head, Tony explained, “That’s not the point. If we’re going to create an alternate timeline anyway, we might as well go to a point in time where we know exactly where Thanos is and what he was doing. If we go to the retirement planet and use the Pym particles to play with time enough so that we can see exactly where and what he does, we run the danger of him picking up on it and fucking with us by using the Stones.”

Steve said quietly, “And this way, we get to spare a version of ourselves from experiencing losing half the universe. We get to save their Vision.”

Meeting that steady blue gaze, Tony knew that Steve would most likely go with the plan; it had that mix of recklessness and idealism that Steve favored.

“Yeah, why not,” Natasha interjected in a surprising show of support. When the others turned to stare at her, she shrugged. “What? It’s a good idea. We have all the footage on the fight with Thanos, we know how to take him down.”

“This time, I’ll aim for his head,” Thor declared, hands clenched by his side.

“What do you think?” Tony asked quietly, wanting to hear Steve say it anyway.

“You want to save two timelines instead of just ours,” Steve said with a smile, holding Tony’s hand and squeezing it gently in front of everyone in the room. “You always were an overachiever, Tony.”

Tony grinned.

It was going to be convoluted and messy and risky.

But they were going to do it together. It would work, Tony knew it would.

\---

What was he thinking? This was absolutely not going to work.

They had gathered everyone they could think of. The Avengers compound was practically crammed these days, with their visitors from space, Wong and other time wizards, Okoye and her entourage, and of course, the Avengers, Extended Version. 

Wong had eventually agreed, with great reluctance, that their plan might work. Okoye had thought they were batshit crazy but she was all in. The desperation in her eyes told Tony all he needed to know about why she was willing to try this out. Clutching at straws to bring back family and loved ones was hardly ringing endorsement for a solid plan.

Tony stared up at the ceiling, seeing scenario after scenario of how this could go so badly wrong.

“Can’t sleep?” Steve murmured into his hair.

They had shared a bed ever since they came back from their trip to the 70s, except they had moved to sharing in Steve’s room instead of the infirmary. After all, Tony didn’t need to be under medical observation anymore, was considered fully recovered even if he hadn’t yet built back his normal muscle tone. Steve was still prone to pressing a wide palm against Tony’s shoulder blades, cupped around his ribs, as if measuring Tony’s progress daily with his bare hands, but that was just Steve’s way of silent worrying. Tony was fine now.

Preferably, they would be having frantic hot sex nightly ever since that make-out session in the closet, but they had been so swept up by the plan to bring everyone back that they hadn’t had the energy at the end of each day beyond falling into bed together, wrapped up in each other’s warmth.

Tony turned his head, tightening his loose hold on Steve’s wrist, anchoring himself in that touch. Steve was pressed up against his side, but there was still something comforting about feeling Steve’s solid flesh beneath his own fingers.

“I don’t know what we’re doing,” Tony forced out. “I’m afraid it isn’t going to work. But it has to work, there’s so much riding on this—”

He cut himself off before he descended into a rambling hysterical spiral. They couldn’t afford for this not to work. Yesterday, Pepper had come to visit, and when she had left, she had hugged Tony long and hard. She had said, “Don’t you dare die on me, Tony, I can’t lose you too.” But she also said, “Please, please, bring them back. Please…”

Pepper had lost her father and her brother. She had just started seeing someone, and had lost him too.

So many people had lost so many people. Bringing them back was all riding on this mad caper of a plan.

He was staking everything on this plan to bring back half the universe…to bring back Peter.

God, Peter… He could barely think his name these days, could barely conjure the memory of his face without feeling like he was falling apart.

Steve pulled him closer, arms wrapping around him tight like that would hold the living nightmare at bay. “I’m afraid too,” Steve confessed, a soft admission into the darkness.

Tony raised his eyebrows. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe Steve, he would be an idiot to think that Steve had never experienced fear before. But the guy who faced down aliens and killer robots with only grim-faced determination sure as hell would have never admitted to feeling fear before, not to Tony, maybe not to anyone. Their relationship had changed a lot, which was why Tony felt he could open up in return.

“What if it doesn’t work?” Tony asked, feeling the weight of it all pressing down on him.

“It has to work. We’re going to make it work,” Steve responded immediately, jaw clenched with familiar stubbornness. At least seeing that gave Tony some level of comfort, knowing that the universe had to go up against Steve Roger’s bullheadedness.

But he still didn’t feel entirely sold. He said quietly, “You can’t know that.” Tony took a deep breath, felt his lungs fill but somehow feeling short of breath still. “I know we have to do this. I just keep wondering if there’s a better way to do this, if we aren’t dooming two different timelines with what we’re going to attempt.”

Slowly, Steve shook his head. “If we don’t go back to that timeline, it’s already doomed. We already know that the worst _will_ happen.”

“But what if we do make it worse, for them and for us?” Tony asked, knowing he was catastrophizing, unable to stop his mouth from doing so. “No plan survives contact with the enemy. What if we mess up and Thanos kills who we have left here? What if Thanos and his army destroys Wakanda because we intervene?”

“What if I lose you too?” Steve cut in, sudden and soft but no less urgent and fearful for it.

Tony opened his mouth, shut it. That was his true worst fear as well but flipped around. Imagining a scenario where he lost Steve too seized his mind with the kind of clawing panic that stopped all rational thought. They had already lost so much…but what if they lost more? What if he lost Steve, after they had finally come back together? Everything was still fragile and new between them, but already it felt like the most amazing, most heart-stoppingly wonderful development in Tony’s life. What if he lost Steve too?

A world without Steve in it would be Tony’s worst fears come true, even before they had gotten together. He felt chilled at the thought, felt weak to his bones just imagining it.

And here Steve was, staring at him with pain-filled eyes, haunted by a similar worry that he would lose this, would lose Tony.

He wanted to reassure Steve, but after everything that had happened, he didn’t know how. There were no certainties in life.

“What if I lose you too?” Tony could only say, echoing Steve’s question and the truth behind his agitation.

The worry in those blue eyes remained, but a familiar steady determination crept in as well. Steve touched Tony’s cheek gently, pressed his palm against the side of his face as if to memorize the feel of him. “I won’t lie to you, not anymore. I can’t promise you that it will never happen. But I can promise you that I’ll be there with you. I can promise you that we’ll do this together.”

“Win or lose,” Tony whispered, feeling his chest squeeze, feeling his heart beat with strength he didn’t know he had. “We’ll do it together.”

Steve nodded and inched closer until they were sharing a pillow, sharing a breath. He said quietly, “I don’t want to be the leading authority on waiting too long anymore.” He looked Tony in the eyes and confessed, voice low but sure, “This isn’t about comfort or shared grief. When I kissed you in that closet, it was because I’ve wanted to for a very long time. For years. I love you, Tony. I’m _in love with you_. And if we live, I want to be with you, if you’ll have me.”

It was the most frank confession of feelings, delivered in the simplest, most straightforward way that Tony had ever heard. There were no stammers of embarrassment, no uncertainty or prevarication. Steve just said it like it was a statement, like loving Tony was just a fact of life. And he laid it all out there, an invitation for Tony to accept or decline.

Tony inhaled sharply, felt stinging in his eyes even though it was so stupid. Why were his eyes wet, now of all times? He tried to blink it away, but Steve’s thumb was already at the corner of one eye, brushing away the moisture.

Squeezing his eyes shut to the tender touch, Tony willed his heart steady, willed his breath to slow down. He opened his eyes and could feel his lips already curved into a hapless smile, could already feel the words shaped by his mouth.

“I love you too, you asshole,” Tony said, as simple and straightforward to match Steve’s statement. “And of course I’ll have you, even if that was the most unromantic confession of feelings I have ever heard. I expect you to repeat this speech under some fireworks and arranged shooting stars when all this is over.”

“Your response isn’t exactly winning any romance awards either,” Steve replied, his eyes bright with relief and happiness, an arm curving around Tony’s waist as they drew closer together.

Tony was talking on autopilot now. “I was just responding in kind. So if you do better, I’ll do better next time.”

“Okay, I’ll remember, fireworks and shooting stars when all this is done,” Steve murmured, because maybe he was answering on autopilot too.

They kissed, and it was sheer joy all over again to have Steve pressed to him, to have their mouths touching. There was an electric thrill when their lips met, a sweet intimacy to touch their tongues together, to explore and learn how they fit together once more. And they seemed to fit together perfectly. Steve’s hands were made to curve around Tony’s hips, while Tony’s thumb was just perfect for drawing a line beneath Steve’s cheekbone. They were like puzzle pieces, incomplete all this time until they finally clicked into place with dizzying satisfaction. 

It wasn’t long before their bodies pressed together, closer together, like any space between them was anathema. Steve pushed a thick thigh between Tony’s legs, rolled his hips in a slow grind that tore an appreciative groan from deep in Tony’s chest. It was electrifying to feel Steve’s hard muscle against his erection, to recognize Steve’s own arousal as a line of blazing hard heat against Tony’s hipbone.

Tony rolled them over so that Steve was flat on his back and Tony was on top of him now. He pulled forward a little so he could get to Steve’s neck, thumb against Steve’s pebbled nipple through his T-shirt, which earned him a sharp inhalation. Rolling his hips, Tony worked Steve’s hard erection beneath his own before dragging his sweatpants-covered ass over that impressive arousal.

“You feel so good,” Tony murmured into Steve’s ear, punctuating his words by mouthing at Steve’s earlobe.

Suddenly, Steve flipped them over, a really athletic move to execute without injury and without tipping them both off the mattress. Tony blinked up from where Steve had him on his back now, their positions reversed. Steve had propped himself up on his elbows on either side of Tony’s head, caging Tony in.

It should be claustrophobic, it should be weirdly intimidating.

But the soft happiness in Steve’s eyes and the fact that this was _Steve_ made it completely different. It just felt…safe.

Tony combed a hand through the short hairs at Steve’s nape and pulled him down for another wet, intimate kiss, sharing delighted murmurs between them. They moved together, hips rocking in unison. It was like their minds were in sync as well, because both their hands were fumbling at their sleep pants together, pushing fabric aside with clumsy fingers until oh god, their hard cocks were lined up against each other.

Writhing, Tony pushed up. He rolled his hips, met Steve’s thrusts head on, could feel Steve’s lovely hard cock pressing against his own, getting wet with pre-come. They rocked and shook until liquefied pleasure roared through their veins, and Tony was arching, blind with pleasure and happiness as he came with Steve’s mouth on his, felt Steve’s hot come spill on his working hands. They ground their hips together, their mixed come making the slide of their semi-hard cocks all the more erotic, sending a fission of overstimulation through Tony. 

Lying there as they panted, having reached orgasm so quickly and clumsily, they might as well be teenage boys all over again.

But Tony couldn’t make himself give a fuck. Steve was right on top of him, limp and heavy and perfect. Tony kissed the side of his cheek in a moment of sheer joy, as if it was going to spill out of him if he didn’t share some of his love around. Thankfully, Steve seemed to understand because he only lightly kissed Tony on the nose in response and then nuzzled Tony’s neck.

Tony closed his eyes, feeling like no matter how tomorrow ended, they at least had this one quiet, perfect moment between them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should I have included a warning for sappiness in this chapter? XD
> 
> Anyway, if you’ve read my other crack-treated-seriously fix-it, _[hold your breath (now let’s go save the world)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18647182)_ , this way of retrieving the Stones might sound familiar. But you might have noticed that I've changed it somewhat because there were some details I wanted to take into account and fix in this story. And there was also something I really wanted to write which is why it’s going to be different to _hold your breath_. Anyway, I hope the execution will work in the next chapter! :D
> 
> We're nearing the end. One more chapter will be posted mid-week, and then the last chapter on Sunday!


	6. Chapter 6

It was a good thing that the time-traveling platform had been built in what had previously been their quinjet hangar, because anywhere else would have been too small.

The hangar bay was crowded with Asgardians and Wakandans, most of whom weren’t actually going back in time with them on what was now dubbed Mission Timey-Wimey. But they all wanted to be there to see what went down, and in case something went disastrously wrong. The Wakandans had troops of their soldiers there and a few teams of scientists. All the Asgardians were there, but that wasn’t saying much since their numbers had been painfully depleted due to the destruction of Asgard followed by the attack by Thanos.

Taking a moment to himself, Tony looked around the circle of people who were suited up and ready to go back in time. Steve and Bruce were in a quiet discussion while Clint and Natasha checked over each other’s suits. Thor was talking to Valkyrie and two other Asgardians who had asked to come along, apparently all strong fighters. There was definitely something brewing between Rhodey and Carol from the way they stood so close together and exchanged comfortable repartee. Okoye was giving final orders to six others from the Dora Milaje. They were all joining them on the mission as well.

Along for the ride was Wong with six other time wizards. He was still reluctant about their plan to mess with time, but he was a little less disapproving about it after finding out that Strange had willingly given up the Time Stone to Thanos after using the Time Stone earlier and seen _one_ scenario out of fourteen million where they won. Tony might have played up that moment a little to get Wong onboard, because it was important to have the current leading expert on time fuckery there to check their homework. Not to mention that the wizards had a crucial part to play in their plan to deal with Thanos.

Oh right, and there was Scott looking around a little wide-eyed. Tony always forgot about him. The gleam in Rocket’s eye as he talked to Nebula was probably a sign that they should kick off soon, because if left idle for too long, that ratty raccoon would get up to no good.

“We better get going, Cap,” Tony said, nudging Steve in the side. “The longer we wait, the antsier we get, and the more likely we’re going to mess up. I don’t want to trip over my jet boots right off the bat and get us all killed.”

“Don’t trip, or Clint will make fun of you forever over it,” Steve said as he nudged Tony back. 

“Please, _you_ would make fun of me forever too,” Tony pointed out.

Steve didn’t even try to deny it, just nodded agreeably. “I would help you up, _and then_ , I would make fun of you forever.”

“I just get no love around here,” Tony sighed, a little dramatically. 

“Really,” Steve said, eyes a little heavy-lidded as he looked at Tony, and he was definitely giving him that intense stare on purpose, there was no way it was by accident. Tony felt his cheeks grow warm, and wow, was he really blushing because of a _look_ Steve was giving him? But he couldn’t help it, that same intimate and affectionate gaze was giving him a quick flashback to tangled limbs in the dark and their softly exchanged words. 

Steve smiled, slow and easy as if he could read Tony’s mind, and asked in a low voice, “You get no love at all?”

“None whatsoever,” Tony replied in an unconvincing croak.

Clint made a face. “Is this some kind of strange flirting? Because it’s gross.”

“I think it’s kind of cute,” Natasha weighed in with a teasing grin. “Gross, but cute.”

“Does this pass for flirting on this planet?” Valkyrie asked in a tone that indicated that she hadn’t seen anything more boring than this before in her life.

“The humans also have this really lame and awkward hip bumping motion that passes for dancing around here,” Rocket piped up. “It looks really stupid.”

Okoye was giving everyone the most unimpressed look that Tony had ever seen grace anyone’s face. Really, that was some outstandingly conveyed disdain, Tony was in awe. He had to take lessons from her, his own typical eye-roll paled in comparison.

Thor laughed and smacked Steve on the back, probably harder than necessary from the wince Steve didn’t bother to hide. “It’s good that you and Stark have finally gotten your act together and made sweet love.” He looked around Steve and smiled broadly at Tony. “I always knew you guys just needed to drop trou—”

“ _Okay!_ ” Tony cut him off, turning to Steve with wide eyes. “Let’s have a speech, shall we?”

Steve looked weary already, but he manned up and squared his shoulders. The superserum must have given him enhanced speech-giving powers, because Steve drew the attention of their circle of friends and the quiet crowd surrounding them just by looking around.

“Two months ago, we lost. All of us,” Steve looked at each and every one of them in the eye. “We lost friends, we lost family…we lost part of ourselves. Today we have a chance to take it all back.” His voice was filled with conviction, iron underlying his words as he continued, “Know your teams, know your mission. Most of us are going somewhere we know, that doesn’t mean we should know what to expect. Be careful, and look out for each other. This is the fight of our lives, and we’re going to win, whatever it takes.”

Tony could almost hear the murmur of, ‘ _whatever it takes’_ going through everyone’s minds, the determination to win this time, to win together.

Steve nodded at them all. “Good luck.”

Rocket looked up at Scott, eyes wide. “He’s pretty good at that.”

“ _Right?_ ” Scott said, shaking his head with a hefty amount of hero worship.

Ignoring the fanboying going on, Tony said to Bruce, “Alright, you heard the man. Stroke those keys, Jolly Green.”

Bruce walked to the control panel and tapped in the final instructions. Without his ability to turn into the Hulk at will right now, he wouldn’t be going back in time with them, but he would be there to watch over the quantum tunnel instead.

They all stood in a circle beneath the unfolding panels of the quantum tunnel. Natasha smiled, looking a little excited, as she said to them, “See you in a minute.”

Their helmets came down, covering all their faces, and then they were being flung back in time.

\---

They had planned everything as much as they could.

They had gone back in time to the battle raging in Wakanda, but they hadn’t just popped into the middle of the Wakandan battlefield. Instead, they had travelled back in time to twenty minutes before their planned entry into the fight, choosing to appear right outside Wakanda. And then they had waited.

Steve and Tony had held hands while they waited. They didn’t even care if they looked like dorks or if the Asgardians and Wakandans judged them forever. This was it, this was going to be the fight of their lives.

They were going to put everything on the line here, and they were risking what was most precious for a chance to save the world. Tony looked at Steve, met his gaze, saw the same hope and fear and determination in his eyes. Steve leaned over and gave Tony a quick kiss on the lips, clearly not caring who was there to see this small, private moment between them. Tony caught hold of the collar of Steve’s new Captain America suit, held him close to deepen the kiss. He wanted to burn this into his memory, to forever remember the warmth of Steve’s body against his, remember the feeling of love and hope that filled him to be here with Steve, with his team.

Then it was time.

It all happened very, very fast after that.

At Steve’s nod, Wong and his fellow wizards used their sling rings to open two portals simultaneously. Without hesitation, Steve leapt through one and Tony flew through the other. It was a little bit of a mindfuck to exit the portal and be greeted by Thanos’ left side, watching him reach out to remove the Soul Stone from Vision’s forehead, except there was the portal open on Thanos’ _other_ side. Steve was hurtling through this portal on Thanos’ right side, and Thanos outstretched hand only smacked into Steve’s extended shield.

Thanos was fast, very fast, his gauntleted hand was already moving to use the power of the Stones. But Tony’s entry had put him right beside the gauntlet and he smashed a large magnet into the palm of the gauntlet. The magnet was made out of vibranium and stronger than the one he had used on Titan. When he activated it, layers upon layers of nanites flowed out and held Thanos’ gauntlet opened. It wouldn’t hold him forever, but it would delay him from using the Stones he had for a few seconds at least.

Steve tried to brace himself when Thanos slammed his still free hand into the shield, but the blow was too powerful and it sent him smashing into Vision and they flew backwards. His heart thudding in his chest, Tony only had time for his eyes to widen before Thanos swung at him with the same hand. He tried to duck, but he took the blow from Thanos to the side of his head, his helmet absorbing what it could but it was still enough to send concussive pain through his head, for his ear to start ringing. But Tony held on to the gauntlet anyway, adding his strength to the magnet pinning Thanos’ gauntlet open. A familiar shield came flying through the air and smashed into Thanos’ head, drawing his attention from Tony.

That was all the distraction they needed to provide. 

Then Carol was there, swooping in from another opened portal behind Thanos, getting a complete drop on him while his focus was on Steve and Tony. She rammed into Thanos’ back and got one arm locked around his neck, pulling him back and off-balanced. Rhodey leapt out of yet another portal and immobilized Thanos’ right arm with massive clamps built in to the War Machine armor. The three of them held him immovable in place. Thanos tried to smash his head back against Carol’s face, but she didn’t even twitch at the impact. Fuck, she was strong, Tony could have whooped from where he was still hanging on to Thanos’ gauntlet.

Unexpectedly, red energy bound around Thanos as Wanda, the Wanda from this timeline who was still alive, rose from the ground where she had fallen and poured her power into keeping Thanos in place, immobilizing him further. She had to be very confused at this turn of events, but she must have figured out enough to help.

Another gold portal opened in the air above and in front of Thanos. There was a boom of displaced air, a flash of blinding white lightning before Thor came roaring out of the portal and smashed Stormbringer down on Thanos.

He didn’t go for his torso this time. But he didn’t go for the head either.

In one fell swoop, he sliced off Thanos’ arm at the elbow. And now Tony was left holding the gauntlet, inside of which still had Thanos’ severed arm. Ewww… Tony backed away, holding tightly to the arm no matter how much it disgusted him.

Thanos screamed in rage and horror at the sight of the stump that remained of his arm. But he didn’t have much time left to scream because Nebula dropped out of the portal where Thor had just exited.

“Nebula,” he started. “Daughter…”

She looked Thanos in the eye and only said, “Bye, dad.”

Then she swung the sword Tony had forged for her, made from the metal plates she had taken from her own body and bound with vibranium given by the Wakandans. In a wide arc, with a scream that bore her hate and anger from all the years she and Gamora suffered in his hands, she loped off Thanos’ head and watched with dark gleaming eyes as her torturer and father slumped into a lifeless heap.

Underneath the leafy foliage, beneath the dappled shadows cast from the bright sunlight shining down on the tall, ancient trees, it was suddenly quiet.

Tony opened his faceplate, to see with his own eyes unfiltered by technology, to try to believe that this was real. Thanos lay on the ground in front of them, dead, in pieces. They had done it. They had defeated him.

Their plan had worked. It had actually _worked_. If it wasn’t for the Iron Man suit, Tony might have slumped to the ground in utter relief.

“What…is going on?” Steve asked.

Except it wasn’t his Steve. This was Steve from the present timeline. Steve 1.0. Steve with…oh my god, he still had his beard. Tony had never properly seen Steve with the full beard that he had heard about and caught sight of in blurry videos and photos when he was being creepy and stalkery during Steve’s fugitive days. But now here was Steve in his full, leonine glory, dark lush beard and longer hair that curled at the ends. Tony wanted to pat his face. He wanted to lick it.

Tony tried to stomp down on the inappropriate thoughts while they had a decapitated Thanos at their feet.

“We don’t have time to explain,” Steve said, _his Steve_ , the one without a beard. The one giving Tony A Look which said they would be discussing this, which meant Tony’s staring hadn’t gone unnoticed. Oops. His Steve looked at bearded Steve and explained succinctly, “We’re from the future, and we’re here to help. We’ve killed Thanos but we still need to stop his army.”

“We have to destroy them,” Thor said, grim and more than a little bloodthirsty. “We cannot let them escape to continue his ambitions in his place.”

Let it not be said that Steves across the multiverse and timelines weren’t quick on their feet and ready to adapt, because bearded Steve immediately started recapping the situation on the ground. “We’re outnumbered and Thanos’ army are hard to kill. They’ve got ships coming in and Wakanda’s forcefield is going down.”

“They won’t have ships for much longer,” Carol said with a smirk, taking to the air.

“They have a lot of ships,” bearded Steve said with a frown.

“Trust me, she can handle it,” Rhodey said, his gaze admiring as he watched her fly in a streak of gold out from the trees into the sky.

Tony turned his eyes skyward as well. It was like poetry in motion. The blaze of gold shot from ship to ship, small and large alike, leaving behind a bloom of fire and destruction. Carol destroyed every enemy ship like the most beautiful, hellbent shooting star to ever grace the skies. All across the battlefield, the people of Wakanda began to holler and shout in a surge of rising triumph. 

Rhodey brought his faceplate down and said, “Can’t let her have all the fun, I’ll help with the army,” before taking off as well.

Steve told his past counterpart, “You have to get on the comms and tell the others that you have help. Tell them not to shoot anyone who seems like a double of who you have on the field. We don’t need friendly fire right now.”

Bearded Steve hesitated, and Tony had a moment of amusement wondering how it must feel for Steve to be on the receiving end of Steve’s own leadership style.

Then his Steve was turning to him. “Tony, secure the gauntlet.”

Oh right. Tony was maybe a little bit dazed, maybe a little concussed but probably just shocked that their plan had worked. He was just standing there like a moron, holding a severed arm that had a gauntlet with absurdly powerful items stuck to them. Shaking the gauntlet a little, he winced as Thanos’ amputated arm fell out.

Tony turned behind him and saw Scott on the other side of a golden portal. He handed the gauntlet over to Scott through the portal, too afraid to even throw it, imagining all kinds of horrific situations where someone intercepted the toss.

“Keep it safe,” Tony said, an unnecessary reminder since they all knew their roles well by now.

Scott gave him a sloppy salute with the gauntlet while Wong nodded at Tony, looking very serious and determined to carry out his responsibility perfectly. It was Tony’s turn to give Wong a sloppy salute, receiving an eyeroll in turn, and the portal sliced shut. The gauntlet should be safe with the wizards, but Scott was there as a last resort. If something really disastrous happened and they got attacked somehow, he would try to shrink with the gauntlet and then hide.

Turning around, Tony saw that everyone was already playing their part. Okoye from their timeline was using her communication beads to tell the Wakandans about the situation while Bearded Steve did the same with the remaining Avengers. Another golden portal opened and a wizard ushered Vision, who was still badly injured, through it and out of the battlefield. That took the last Infinity Stone away from Wakanda and Thanos’ army.

Tony and Steve — his Steve, not the beardly one — looked at each other and smiled. It was time to clean up.

\---

Things moved rapidly. Destroying Thanos’ army was difficult but extremely satisfying. Tony had a hell of a time blasting at aliens and chasing them down. Watching the explosions as Carol streaked through the sky, as Rhodey used his new complement of missiles, it had been a thing of beauty. Rhodey from this Alternate Timeline had apparently been pretty jealous. The two Thors had been hilariously competitive, so the battlefield had been constantly streaked with jagged lightning. The two Natashas and the two Okoyes had teamed up to wreck holy havoc, while Clint had kept to the trees to pick off stragglers.

Steve — Tony’s Steve, not the bearded version — had eventually left the battlefield to escort Vision back to Shuri’s lab, where apparently he had convinced Shuri that it was important to finish the procedure to remove the Mind Stone from Vision’s forehead. Having Vision’s life be dependent on such a powerful and unknown artefact was a terrible idea, not to mention how it made him an attractive target for any power-hungry madmen.

Once Shuri had removed the Mind Stone, she didn’t seem to care where it went, as long as Steve cleared out of her lab so she had space to work and help destroy the invaders from inside her tech haven. Steve had hustled out with the Mind Stone and a snapshot of Vison’s mind that he had asked from Shuri.

With the Mind Stone secured and the last of Thanos’ army being destroyed, Steve had gotten on the comms to call back all the time-travelers.

“It’s time to finish our mission,” Steve had said into his comms, grinning at Tony by his side.

When the others all gathered again, bearded Steve was back, being savvy enough to have been keeping an eye on them. He asked, “Where are you going with the Stones?”

He sounded suspicious, which just made him a smart guy.

“In our timeline, everything is fucked up,” Tony said, retracting his helmet to look Steve in the eye. “Thanos managed to use the Stones and he wiped out half the universe. We’re using the Stones to reverse that. But we’ll bring the Stones back afterwards, pinky swear.”

“We’re borrowing the Stones, but we’ll be back with them. It will only seem like a few seconds to you,” Steve tried to assure bearded Steve.

There was a pause, a moment of silence as bearded Steve clearly weighed up what they were saying. And maybe he believed them, or maybe he just didn’t give a fuck about those damned Stones anymore, because he just nodded and said, “Good luck.”

Tony took a deep breath and smiled. “We’ll need it.”

And then they were traveling back to their own timeline again, arriving with shocking dizziness, greeted by cheers and shouting before they even got their bearings as Scott held up the gauntlet in triumphant victory.

So now here they were, standing around the gauntlet, staring at it. The hangar bay was too crowded at this point as everyone who found a way to wrangle a visit was here; Wakandans, Asgardians and time wizards alike.

Now, they had all the Infinity Stones and it was time to pull the trigger.

There had been a lot of arguments over who would wield the gauntlet. The usage of it was clearly destructive and potentially lethal to most baseline humans based on what it did to Thanos-from-their-timeline — time travel made things so fucking confusing — so they had to be careful about who to pick. Despite Thor enthusiastically volunteering himself, Bruce won the debate in the end, noting that when they scanned the gauntlet and Thanos’ body, they were both pouring out a staggering amount of Gamma radiation. That made the Hulk a closer match to Thanos than anyone else, so he had the best chance of surviving it.

Tony looked Bruce in the eye and said with not a small amount of nerves, “Remember what we discussed, what to wish for.”

“I’ve got it,” Bruce said, eyes on the golden gauntlet.

Tony was transfixed, couldn’t look away, his heart racing even as he activated the Iron Man suit and pulled up a shield. Staying close by his side, Steve lifted his shield as well, pressed almost shoulder to shoulder with Tony. This was it. Everything they had done was for this moment, but there was also a possibility that they would lose Bruce with this, that they would lose their friend who was still desperate to prove himself after what he went through against Thanos.

There had been enough deaths already. Tony didn’t know what he would do if he lost Bruce too.

But they were out of time and out of options.

They all held their breaths as Bruce pushed his hand into the gauntlet—

—and screamed.

It was a primal, agony-filled sound that raised the hairs on the back of Tony’s neck. Within his closed helmet, Tony gasped, shocked by the sight of Bruce falling to his knees, at the immediate ripple of green that tore through his body as Bruce screamed and screamed but somehow kept the Hulk change at bay.

“Get it off him, it’s killing him!” Thor shouted, trying to rush forward, except Valkyrie held him back.

And it was killing him. Bruce was screaming like he was dying an agonizing death. Maybe what they were trying was too much. Maybe the gauntlet was just too much for any of them.

Rocket shot off the table and shouted, “Grab him, we have to share the load! We did it with Quill once when he held the Power Stone, we can do this!”

And then the crazy snarky little furball hurtled forward and grabbed Bruce’s elbow. He started screaming as well, a shrill animalistic shriek of pure pain.

Valkyrie couldn’t hold Thor back this time. With lightning crackling across the ceiling, Thor broke free of her grasp and was right there beside them, kneeling down to grab hold of Bruce’s shoulder. Thor’s head shot up and they saw his eyes flared white with lightning as he added his roar of pain to the cacophony of sounds.

Retracting his helmet, Tony looked to Steve and Steve returned his wide-eyed stare. Tony knew what they had to do. Maybe they would all die. Maybe this would be their last stand.

But they had to try.

He leapt forward with Steve by his side, feeling more than seeing Natasha and Clint jumping forward on his other side, no hesitation in their midst. They came together, closed ranks around Bruce, hands reaching out to clasp his arms and shoulders.

It wasn’t just pain, although there was so much of it, _fuck, there was so much of it_. It was a kind of agony that ripped at their souls, that felt like it was drilling right down to their molecules and taking them apart. It was the pain and the _energy_. Tony felt like his heart was going to surge right through his chest, felt the raw power tearing through his body and threatening to burn every cell of his body to nothing.

The pain and power was too much. He couldn’t contain it, no one could. Tony’s head turned, creaked just the slightest so he could see Steve, wanting to go with the sight of Steve in his eyes. Steve was also turned towards him, his face looked almost lit up from the inside with pure white light, mouth slightly opened and eyes wide as he sought Tony out, their last looks and breaths before they went. Steve smiled, in pain but right there with him, and Tony smiled back even as he felt like he was about to blow up into little pieces, because at least they were together, at least—

Then there were hands and arms around them, everywhere, bodies pressing close and Tony was dazed, confused, wondered if he had already died and maybe this was the afterlife, a smothering of people crowding close and holding him still as they drew the pain away…

He blinked, slowly, gasping, suddenly aware that he could hear the rasp of his breath. This wasn’t death or the afterlife. They were still here, still alive.

And there were hands and arms around them. They were being held by…everyone. Everyone who could fit in the hangar bay, who had turned up because they wanted to see Thanos’ work undone, wanted to watch the world being restored. Every single one of them was pressing close so they could share the burden; the remaining Asgardians who were fighters and survivors of profound tragedy, the Wakandans who risked everything to shield the world and who would do it all over again, the sorcerers who knew what it was like to live in the shadows defending the world from untold horrors, the superheroine who laughed as she flew and seemed to be made out of pure energy, the blue alien who was more robot than flesh and also more courage than victim, the genius raccoon who didn’t let anything or anyone keep him down for long, the man who grew and shrunk and brought them hope…and the Avengers, who had been together through so much loss and pain and was not going to lose another one here. 

The pain spread out in a ripple, echoed by grunts and moans of pain as the untold energy was shared among all of them until it was still shockingly painful on a cellular level…but survivable. Steve was grinning, breaking out in a joyous smile because he knew, just like Tony knew, that they would make it. They would be alright.

Bruce looked up and smiled, green veins pulsing in his neck, his eyes electric green. “Thanks, guys.”

Then he held up the gauntlet and snapped his fingers.

The surge of energy blew through all of them, a shocking burning pulse that smashed through…and then was gone.

Bruce threw the gauntlet off onto the floor in front of him, panting as he cradled his left arm. It was more green than human at this point, the Hulk’s powers straining to get out so as to keep Bruce alive. The arm seemed a little singed, a bit dark and raw looking, but otherwise, it was intact. Bruce opened and closed his fist in surprise.

“Did it work?” Bruce asked in little more than a whisper as Thor helped him to his feet.

They looked up, looked around. It was hard to tell, since the hangar bay had been sealed up tight for this moment. And they didn’t know how the effect would work, how the wish would be granted.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., open her up,” Tony said, voice shaky but not even giving a fuck. Steve moved closer to him, and they both leaned on each other as they caught their breath, still feeling unsteady. 

The ceiling started to part, all the sealed windows and doors sliding open in soft, mechanical whirring.

The first thing that stood out was that it wasn’t quiet anymore. Tony hadn’t even noticed how quiet the world had become until suddenly, he could hear the beginnings of birdsong and the rustle of leaves in the wind.

The world was coming _alive_.

While he had been steeped in his personal loss, he hadn’t really digested how Thanos’ stupid decision had wiped out half of all life from Earth too, how much he had destroyed with that move.

Okoye was suddenly there, grabbing Wong by the arm. “Take us back. Take us to Wakanda, we need to see…” She broke off, her eyes wet but her voice steady and unshakeable. “We need to see if they’re back.”

Wong nodded and turned to another one of his wizard friends. “I’ll open the portal to Wakanda. Some of you go back to the Sanctums, people will be coming back and they’ll need all the help they can get.”

There were nods all around, and people moved back, made space for him to use his sling ring to open a portal.

On the other side of the portal, the green seemed even more vibrant than normal, the lush plants filling their view. Okoye and several Wakandans plunged through without a word, without question.

“We should go as well,” Steve said, a hand on Tony's armored elbow, before he checked with Bruce. “Are you okay? How are you feeling?”

Thor was already checking Bruce over and dusting off his clothes unnecessarily, like Bruce even gave a shit about all that. But it was probably more for Thor’s benefit than Bruce’s to give him a once over. Bruce clenched and unclenched the hand he had used for the gauntlet.

“It kind of hurts, which…I’ve never felt something hurt even after Hulk started to wear the pain. But I think I’m okay,” Bruce said, still looking at his arm.

“Good to hear, buddy,” Tony said, patting him on the shoulder. “You did it, Bruce. _You did it._ ”

Bruce met Tony’s probably manic grin with a smaller smile of his own. “We all did it together.”

Then Thor swept Bruce up in a bear hug and was crying into his hair despite Bruce waving his arms and protesting the treatment. Maybe Bruce would finally find a way to unleash Hulk again just to get out of Thor’s emotional embrace, Tony thought with amusement.

He bent down to pick up the gauntlet and all the Stones. They were all still intact, all still embedded in the gauntlet. “Better take this with us,” he murmured.

Steve nodded, and then Steve, Tony, Clint and Natasha were trooping through the portal to see what had happened in Wakanda. As they stepped through, Tony thought he heard Thor’s cry of hoarse happiness, along with a rumble of thunder, but the portal was already closing behind them. Maybe one of the dusted Asgardians had come back? Tony could only hope.

But Tony’s heart sank quickly once he looked around. Yes, the sounds of birds and insects were louder now, but he wasn’t sure if he was just hearing what he wanted to hear. Nothing else seemed to have changed. He wasn’t the only one looking around, uncertainty on everyone’s faces.

Then there was a long, loud cry, enough for them to turn and instinctively rush towards it. They hadn’t made it more than twenty steps when they caught sight of Okoye embracing someone. No, not just someone.

 _T’Challa_. He looked confused, standing there in his Black Panther suit, being squeezed by Okoye who didn’t look terribly touchy-feely on a good day. But he returned the hug, and then asked quietly but not quietly enough for those of them with super hearing or questionable tech on them to miss him saying, “What is going on here, Okoye? I felt…I felt very strange just a moment ago, like I was becoming weightless. And then…”

Okoye was already pulling herself together, becoming once more the strong general to answer her king’s question. “We have a lot to talk about.”

It worked.

_It worked._

“Groot!” cried Rocket, flying forward and mashing himself against what looked to be a small tree with _a face_ trying to get up from the ground.

Tony heard a choked sound, turned around to see Steve staring as Bucky emerged from behind a tree, eyes focused on his own hand. Bucky looked up with a frown and said to Steve, “I had a strange hallucination that my arm was disappearing.”

In a few strides, Steve was in front of Bucky and pulling him into a rough hug, squeezing him tight as Bucky held him in return with a confused look on his face. Bucky met Tony’s gaze from over Steve’s shoulder and his eyes widened, looking shocked and uncertain. But whatever misplaced animosity Tony had held towards Bucky had dissipated, had been worked out just weeks after what happened in Siberia because it had never been Bucky who had earned his prolonged ire. So Tony only smiled encouragingly at Bucky, which had the unintended effect of making Bucky look even more uncertain and worried now. Tony had to stifle a chuckle, finally looking away to hide how his eyes were tearing up a little at seeing this reunion.

He was so happy for Steve. And he knew, he was hoping that there would be happiness to go around, when he had his own reunion and could see with his own eyes…

But it wouldn’t be any time soon, maybe. He turned and searched the crowd, triumph and hope filling him when he noticed Wakandans embracing their returned loved ones and friends, seeing Rhodey fly over calling out for Sam, whom Tony knew would have to be around here somewhere, watched Natasha and Clint help Wanda to her feet and pulling her into a comforting huddle, probably trying to explain everything that happened and how it was going to be okay. Then Clint’s phone started ringing, and from the way his hands shook when he looked at the screen, Tony knew who it would be. Clint had gotten his family back.

Everyone was back…

Everyone…

Tony’s eyes landed on Carol, who was looking around with a growing smile on her face, a look of pure satisfaction that they had succeeded. Well, no time like the present to enact the next part of the plan. 

He walked over to her and said, “About our rescue plan… I know it’s a bit of a rush, after everything that just happened, but I was thinking maybe we leave for Titan in an hour? Give you some time to go see your family and friends, then we can meet back at the Avengers compound and use the Milano—”

Carol put a hand on his armored shoulder, cutting of his ramble and giving him a small smile. “We can meet back at the compound in fifteen minutes. I don’t know if you noticed, but other than my general awesomeness, I can also fly very fast. It’s not going to take me an hour to talk to everyone. We’ll be out rescuing your stranded friends from alien planets in no time.”

“Yeah, we noticed your awesomeness and speed. You never let us forget about your awesomeness,” Tony pointed out, feeling some of the tension seep out of him at her reassurance and light banter. 

“I _am_ pretty awesome,” Carol said with a grin, putting a hand on one hip. 

Smiling, thinking that Carol kind of reminded him of himself except she was hotter and way stronger, Tony said with as much sincerity as possible, “Thanks, Carol. I don’t think we could have done any of this without you here.”

“ _All of us_ needed to be here to get this done,” Carol said, matter-of-fact. 

Tony opened his mouth to respond, to parry back, but then there was a voice behind him. A voice that was achingly familiar…

“Mister Stark?”

Tony turned, was almost too afraid to look, to actually see if…if…

Peter Parker leapt through a blazing gold ring, New York’s Sanctum on the other side of the portal. Peter’s hair was a mess, his once shiny new Iron Spider suit dusty with the red earth of Titan. His brown eyes were wide and brimming with excitement as he landed in front of Tony, his hands already coming up to gesture wildly.

“Hey, woah, holy cow, you would not believe what’s been going on! You remember when we were out in space, and I got all dusty? And I must have passed out because I woke up and you were gone, but Doctor Strange was there, right, and he was like, it’s been two months, come on, they need us, then he started doing that yellow sparkly thing that he does all the time.” He even started copying the motions Doctor Strange always did with the sling ring, and it was just too much, Tony couldn’t take it anymore. Peter startled. “What are you doing—”

Tony pulled Peter into a heartfelt hug, squeezing him tight and thinking he had never felt so much relief in his life, that he had never felt such dizzying happiness that they _had won_. They had done it. They had reversed Thanos’ destruction and they had brought back everyone, they had brought back Peter Parker, who had looked at Tony with such hope and respect every time, had been so afraid when he had been turning to dust, had been looking to Tony for something, for a way to change what was happening.

And they had done that. They had changed what happened and saved everyone. They had saved Peter.

Tony knew he was crying, felt the wetness against his lashes, but he just squeezed his eyes shut and didn’t give a fuck at all, because _Peter was alive_.

“Oh, this is nice,” Peter murmured, his voice confused but sounding kind of pleased as well, clasping Tony back around his armored shoulders.

Taking a deep breath, Tony pulled back, let Peter go and just looked at him, appreciated that he was here and alive, solidly alive.

“On your left, motherfuckers,” Sam whooped, swooping by low over all of them.

Rhodey landed with a thump in his War Machine suit next to Tony, lifting his faceplate to roll his eyes. “I found him lying around like Sleeping Beauty and told him what happened. He wanted a grand entrance of course.”

Tony looked and saw a few people moving so that Sam could land in a running-jog and come to a stop next to Steve, purposefully jostling Bucky at the same time. Steve hugged Sam as well, the relief palpable from all the way here. Almost as if he could feel Tony’s gaze, Steve looked up from over Sam’s shoulder and smiled a watery smile, tears in his eyes. Tony was pretty sure he looked no better as he returned the happy look.

Resting an arm around Tony’s shoulders, both their armors clanking together a little awkwardly, Rhodey said, “We did good, Tones.”

“Yeah… Yeah, we did,” Tony said, grinning at Rhodey and then at Peter.

“Um… I guess? I don’t even know what happened, but we must be okay since we don’t seem to be fighting anymore?” Peter said in confusion.

“We killed the bad guy and brought everyone back,” Carol summarized with a smirk, clearly enjoying all the happy reunions all around.

“Oh, hi!” Peter said brightly, taking in her blue, red and gold costume and promptly filling up with new enthusiasm at seeing someone who was obviously another superhero. “I’m Peter Parker.”

She grinned at his enthusiasm. “Hi, Peter Parker. How did you get back here? Sounds like you were the one we were supposed to rescue from Titan.”

“That was me.” And Doctor Strange stepped through the open portal. “I used a portal to bring us back to Earth, taking us to New York’s Sanctum. I was told that most of you would probably be at Wakanda and so we came here.”

“You can open a portal to Earth from a different planet?” Rhodey asked, a note of incredulity in his voice, and Tony heartily agreed with his sentiment. What the fuck. “So you can just go planet-hopping to wherever you want without even using spaceships?”

“No, I can only go to places I have seen before and that I can picture in my mind,” Strange said, like that was perfectly obvious.

Tony and Rhodey exchanged disgusted looks, and Tony muttered under his breath, “ _Magic_.”

“So, how did you fix what happened?” Strange asked, trying to sound casual.

Tony frowned at him suspiciously. “Wouldn’t you already know? Isn’t this the one possibility where we succeeded out of the 14 million scenarios you saw?”

Strange looked around at everyone and only said, “Not…quite.”

Fucking magicians, seriously. So they told him what had happened, and he repaid them by not telling them what he saw instead. Whatever. From the caginess, it was doubtful the future Strange saw had been all that great. Really, it wasn’t surprising that there was more than one way to defeat Thanos. A one in 14 million chance was better odds compared to winning the lottery in most places. 

“You need to return the Stones to the alternate reality you created,” Strange said with a slight frown.

“We don’t need to graduate from Hogwarts to know that much,” Tony grumbled. The guy just got back and he was already trying to boss them around. Couldn’t he see that Tony was already doing all the bossing? There wasn’t enough room in Wakanda for that many bossy geniuses. “That’s our plan all along. But first…there’s someone we need to bring back. We need to make sure it works before we do another trip.”

“What do you mean?” Peter asked, confused.

Tony turned to where Wanda was crying against Natasha’s shoulder, red flaring from her hands as anguish rippled through her. He looked up to see that Steve had come up to his side and was reaching out to hold Tony’s gauntleted hand.

“There’s one more friend we have to save,” Steve said, his voice sounding steady and sure that they could do this.

Tony was glad someone was certain, because he wasn’t very sure at all.

\---

“Maybe we can do this another day. A lot has happened and there’s a lot of information to take in,” T’Challa said, a protective hand on Shuri’s back.

There were nods all around the room, and Bruce chimed up in agreement, “There’s no rush. When we return the Infinity Stones to that alternate timeline, we can return them at exactly the same point when we left with the Stones. So technically, how much time passes here doesn’t matter.”

Shuri waved her hands in the air like she was batting away all their concern. “But I’m _fine_. Stop being such a big overprotective wet blanket, T’Challa,” Shuri said, elbowing her brother in his side. He made a face at her and she rolled her eyes right back at him. “I can handle it! What’s the big deal? Something terrible happened and we all disappeared? I don’t even remember that so who cares? We have Tony Stark here handing me data on Vision’s mind, a mindmap copied by an alternate timeline’s version of _me_. This is the best thing that has happened to me in _years_.”

Tony couldn’t help but grin at Shuri’s enthusiasm. He liked her a lot already.

“Okay, okay,” T’Challa said, raising his hands under her glare. “Please, princess, continue as you like.”

“I will. Also, I’m totally traveling back in time to that alternate timeline to talk to myself too,” Shuri announced quickly.

T’Challa’s expression turned stormy. “No, you’re not. That’s too dangerous.”

“I so am,” she declared, eyes flicking to Tony. Behind T’Challa’s back, Tony gave her a thumbs up of agreement, and she beamed.

Steve sighed, probably already foreseeing a royal argument in his near future.

“Is it still going to be Vizh?” Wanda asked, her quiet voice breaking through the bickering.

Tony fidgeted, feeling a little guilty that they had been arguing like this while Wanda waited there. It was a good thing that they had left Vision’s lifeless android body in an enclosed box, out of sight, but ready to be worked on.

“What do you mean?” Natasha asked, a comforting hand on Wanda’s elbow.

“I mean…is it still going to be him? You’ve brought back the mindmap of Vision from…from about two months ago, from an alternate timeline where you’ve changed things. That’s not Vision anymore. My Vision… He’s dead,” she said, her voice cracking on the last word, all of it said in a flat tone of someone who had experienced so much personal loss that she had grown to accept it.

Shuri shook her head and explained, “This isn’t a different Vision. It’s the same Vision. I’m not going to replace what we have here, I’m just going to repair the damage that was done by removing the Mind Stone forcibly, filling the bits of missing code and tying it all back together based on what we see in the mindmap we got from Vision in that alternate timeline. The other me got to complete what I was interrupted doing. She finished untangling the Mind Stone from Vision, and she got a full, complete scan and mindmap of Vision. We’re just going to repair our Vision using her scan.”

“It doesn’t sound like it’s the same Vision,” Wanda said, her voice shaky. “My Vision… My Vision is dead. Right now. How can he come back? It’s like, it’s like saying we can bring Pietro back, when I know we can’t.”

Tony and Steve stepped towards Wanda, Steve immediately putting an arm around her shaking shoulders as tears trickled down her eyes. She looked at Steve, beseeching, wanting to believe but not being able to.

But Tony was the one to answer, because Vision… He knew Vision. Before he was Vision, he was J.A.R.V.I.S., and J.A.R.V.I.S had once been Tony’s. And Tony knew what Wanda meant. “Vision is a person, but he was never human,” Tony started, his low voice pulling Wanda’s attention towards him. “Don’t treat Vision like a human. There’s no repairing a dead human body, but Vision isn’t one. You fell in love with an android. We can fix an android. Appreciate that with Vision, we get the second chances that we don’t get with humans.”

It was a risk to say it, with the history they had between them. But Wanda knew Vision’s history with Tony, knew the unspoken bond they had as well. And finally, her eyes resolved, the aching despair clearing a little with hope.

“Okay,” she whispered. “Let’s try it.”

\---

When Vision sat up from the table, the first person he looked towards was Wanda, like he knew where she was the moment he gained consciousness.

“Wanda,” he murmured, a small smile on his face.

Whatever she saw in his eyes, she knew it was Vision. She flew into his arms — possibly literally, there were red sparks dancing on the floor — and they fell into a tight embrace.

“Alright, let’s give them some space,” Natasha said, ushering everyone out from where they had been standing around and watching the procedure.

Shuri turned with a grin towards Tony and Steve. “So, when are we time and reality traveling?”

T’Challa groaned, already knowing this was a battle he would not win.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what I was really keen to include was the Multiverse and talking to Alternate Timeline characters! \o/ You will see a bit more of that next chapter!
> 
> When I first started writing this, I hadn’t realized that Endgame intended for Bruce’s arm to be permanently damaged, so I was looking for another way for him to carry out the Snap without sacrificing the arm too. 
> 
> Last chapter will be posted on the weekend!


	7. Chapter 7

When they returned to what Tony now called the Alternate Timeline, they reappeared just a few seconds after they had left, in the exact same grassy spot they had vanished from. To Steve from that timeline, who was staring right at them, they would have looked like they had blinked out of existence after hitting their time-traveling GPS and then reappeared after a few seconds. 

“We did say we would return,” Tony pointed out to Alternate Timeline Steve’s wide eyed stare. 

They hadn’t brought back a full team this time, since there was no real need for it. It was only Steve, Tony, Bruce, Shuri, Okoye and Thor. Shuri was not staying behind and T’Challa wasn’t letting her go without Okoye.

The other superheroes from the Alternate Timeline came into the clearing, possibly called in by this timeline’s Steve. 

Almost immediately, Shuri shot forward, and Alternate Timeline Shuri — or Alt Shuri for short, Tony couldn’t keep calling them Alternate Timeline versions of themselves, not without going nuts — met her halfway. They were already rambling about time travel, how it worked, the ramifications, and also, with their brain power times two, could they finally crack their Magic Shoes Experiment. Tony would have to ask Shuri about that project later, anything that was of interest to her had to be exciting work.

Alt Steve stepped forward and asked almost urgently, “Did it work?”

Before anyone could answer, a glowing gold circle split the air between them and out stumbled some familiar figures, jumping through from a desolate dusty planet which made Tony shiver just to glimpse again.

“Trust you to make a dramatic entrance,” Tony said to his other self, who had frozen with wide-eyed shock at the sight of them.

Steve, his Steve, not Alt Steve, immediately stepped forward, worry in his voice. “You’ll need immediate medical treatment.”

But before he could get there, Alt Steve was at Alt Tony’s side, a sturdy shoulder for Alt Tony to lean on. Wow, Alt Steve had moved _fast_ to be the first to help Alt Tony. And Alt Tony looked like he needed it. Damn, but Tony had no idea he had looked so rough on Titan, he had been too busy being completely defeated by Thanos and then being a miserable sad sack with a literal hole in his gut, because… well, all that was done with. They had fixed it, so Tony was going to do his level best to never think about it again.

Alt Tony’s face was grimy and bruised, with blood smeared against his forehead. He also didn’t have a full suit of armor anymore, just pieces of it formed over his torso and as gauntlets over his hands, with his lower body and arms mostly exposed. That made sense, since in Tony’s own fight against Thanos, he had ran out of nanites to form a full armor. Alt Tony must have been gearing up for a fight the best way he could, even with an incomplete Iron Man armor. 

All of them looked the worst for wear. Peter looked pale, dirty and tired, although his eyes were still bright with his irrepressible excitement at everything in general. The Guardians and Strange were equally grimy, each with their own injuries to tend to as they stood there, looking around in clear confusion.

“We lost, we couldn’t stop him, Steve,” Alt Tony was saying, eyes filled with horror as he leaned his weight on Alt Steve and talked to him like he was the only one there in the world, like he had already forgotten that he had been staring directly at his own lookalike a second ago. “We have to do something, he could be on Earth already.”

Alt Steve was shaking his head and had put a calming hand to Alt Tony’s chestplate. “He already came to Earth, his army was here. But it’s okay, Tony. It’s going to be okay, we— Actually, _they_ stopped him.”

Now the interlopers were at the receiving end of Alt Tony’s laser stare. Tony turned to Alt Strange instead, because he was a contrary bastard, and also maybe to do one small nice thing and give his other self some time to absorb all of this. “Hey, how did you come to Wakanda? I thought you could only go to places which you had already seen before?”

Alt Strange was staring at him with a deep furrow between his brows. “Stark said that Vision might be in Wakanda, or at least Wakanda would know where Vision was. We knew Thanos would be after the Mind Stone, so we came here. And I’ve seen Wakanda before.”

“When?” Both Okoyes asked with a suspicious glare. Tony almost laughed at the stereo sound effect, combined with their twin expressive looks of distaste.

“Irrelevant,” Strange said, unperturbed.

The wizard was a sneaky bastard, but Tony was unsurprised by that.

Alt Peter had one hand creeping into the air, looking around with delight and interest.

“You really don’t have to raise your hand to talk, kid,” Tony said with a smile.

“What’s going on? Why are there are two Mister Starks and two Captain Americas? And…sorry, I don’t know, uh, all of you actually.” Peter paused to gesture at both Okoyes and then pretty much the entire Wakandan army. “Is there going to be more fighting?”

Steve, Tony’s Steve to be precise, stepped back to Tony’s side and said in a calm, don’t-alarm-the-civilians tone, “I think we need to recap for the new arrivals, then we can probably go. Captain, do you want to do the honors?”

Ah, that was his Steve alright, having foreseen that recapping about how they swooped in and saved the day was probably not going to go down well with a bunch of warriors. Best to leave this to the non-time travelers to explain.

As Alt Steve recounted events from his point of view for the people in his timeline, Tony noticed that Alt Tony still had an arm around Alt Steve, and neither looked likely to part soon. He wondered if there would be yelling and dramatic shoving of an arc reactor into Alt Steve’s hands later. In retrospect, that really was symbolic in pretty telling ways, and Tony’s subconscious should be ashamed of itself at how blatant that was.

“You just let them borrow the Infinity Stones to a different timeline?” Alt Strange interjected with substantial horror as Alt Steve was winding down.

Alt Steve said wryly, with a lot of self-awareness, “I don’t think we could have stopped them even if we tried.”

Tony rolled his eyes and piped up, “We brought the Stones back, didn’t we?”

“But...how? Where are you even from?” Alt Tony asked, looking utterly baffled.

Tony met his confused gaze and explained, “ _When_ is probably the more accurate question. We’re from what used to be your future, 65 days to be precise. It’s no longer going to be your future, because we’ve changed things and this is an alternate timeline now. In our timeline, no one manages to stop Thanos. He snaps his fingers and half of the universe, half of all sentient life and animals, turn into dust. We _lost_.”

Tony felt Steve’s hand on the elbow of his armor, a reminder that Steve was there with him. Shaking his head, Tony looked away from everyone. Damnit, they had fixed everything and they had gotten everyone back. Why did Tony still feel that tightening in his chest, the shortness of breath as he remembered the people around him _disintegrating_.

Thankfully, Steve took up his thread of explanation while Tony tried to compose himself. “We lost, and the Infinity Stones were destroyed by Thanos. So...Tony went and solved time travel.” 

Oh, the way Steve said it, the matter of fact tone a thin veneer over the pride in his voice... Tony avoided what would have been an overly sappy gaze sent in his direction and waved his hand airily. “Eh, I kind of just piggybacked off Pym’s research and built a cheat code.”

“You solved _time travel_ ,” Steve insisted stubbornly.

Why was it that Tony could boast about all his achievements for hours without coming up for air but a note of pride in Steve was enough to make him want to scuff the floor with his foot and go ‘aw, shucks’. He had never ‘aw, shucks’ anything in his life before this!

Ignoring that comment, Tony rambled, “To summarize, we came back in time to this moment to stop Thanos in your timeline, _you’re welcome_ , and to borrow your Infinity Stones to reverse what Thanos did in our timeline, _thank you_.”

“And it all worked,” Alt Steve said, looking at them, his gaze darting between Steve and Tony.

He didn’t need to clarify for them to get what he was asking without asking. Steve nodded. “It worked. We brought half the universe back.”

“And somewhat more than that,” Bruce said, looking a little sheepish.

But Alt Steve and Alt Tony were already looking at each other, looking shocked and amazed and…relieved. A flood of relief. The world wasn’t at its end, not anymore. Tony felt a pang of envy that this Steve and this Tony wouldn’t go through the heart-numbing grief of losing so many people, of losing in the big fight for the world.

As if sensing his thoughts, Steve’s hand slipped down to wrap around Tony’s gauntleted hand, entwining their fingers together. He squeezed comfortingly, and Tony felt better for it, even though he could barely feel Steve’s hold through the armor. Regardless of what happened, they made it out the other end together.

Despite his exhaustion and probable mental turmoil, Alt Tony’s observant eyes hadn’t missed that they were now holding hands. It was like another blow to his psyche and he was practically gaping at their joined hands. Alt Steve noticed Alt Tony’s distraction, and he followed the line of his gaze. Now Alt Steve was also staring at them like his brain was undergoing a Blue Screen of Death moment.

“That’s a new development,” Alt Sam said, not quietly enough. Alt Bucky raised his eyebrows but also gave Steve a knowing smile and an approving nod behind his own Steve’s back.

“I don’t know what’s happening here,” Alt Tony said, sounding a little dazed.

That seemed to shake Alt Steve out of his shocked staring and he turned back to Alt Tony. “We need to get you to a doctor immediately, you might be suffering from blood loss.”

Alt Tony shook his head immediately, holding his ground against Alt Steve’s pleading gaze. Those were some seriously sad puppy eyes that Alt Steve was directing at his counterpart.

“Did you always look at me like that?” Tony mumbled out the corner of his mouth at Steve. “Is this some negotiation tactic Captain America uses on innocent billionaires?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Steve said with a placid smile that Tony totally knew was fake.

“He used it all the time on you,” Thor said from Tony’s other side, sounding amused and not even bothering to keep his voice down.

Steve sighed. “Come on, Thor, leave a guy some secrets.”

But Alt Tony was still shaking his head against Alt Steve’s looks and only said, “I already sealed my wound. And clearly it’ll hold, because we have future-me here and he’s still alive. I can wait a couple hours, I want to see this through.”

“Smurfette patched me up actually,” Tony said, nodding at Alt Nebula. “She’s pretty nimble at closing gaping open wounds.”

“Pretty nimble at making them too,” Alt Nebula responded with a sharp grin.

“That’s the murderous blue gal I know and love,” Tony said, laughing. That comment caused Alt Nebula to draw back in clear confusion and unsettlement.

Bruce spoke up, “Uh, can we return the Infinity Stones already? It’s making me nervous holding the galaxy’s most powerful Stones here.”

“How do they even work?” Alt Shuri asked.

Their Shuri shrugged. “From what I’ve heard, they’re like magic Dragon Balls.”

“You watched Dragonball too? All my other friends say it’s too old, only Ned watched it with me,” Alt Peter said, inching towards them.

“Please, I read the manga,” Shuri said with a negligent handwave and turned to her counterpart. “You should send him our scanlations. The manga is so much better.”

Throughout this clearly titillating exchange, Bruce was handing over the burned gauntlet and the Infinity Stones to Alt Steve. He explained, “The gauntlet got a bit charred up holding the power of the Stones, but I think Shuri or Tony could make a gauntlet that would work as a one-time use for the Stones.”

“You think we should use it?” Alt Steve asked, surprised.

“It’s up to you, but it’s possible, and we know the way to use it now,” Bruce said, rubbing the back of his neck. “It wouldn’t be as much of a danger for you, since we know how to safely do it.

“But Thanos didn’t win here. And we’ve destroyed his army,” Alt Natasha pointed out.

Their Thor stepped forward, meeting Alt Thor’s mismatched gaze. “You can bring back those that Thanos have killed.”

Alt Thor, who had looked mostly checked out during the entire proceedings, suddenly came to life, his eyes ablaze. “What did you say? Do not joke about this with me.”

“I’m not,” Thor said, steady and firm. “We’ve done it.”

“Wait, I thought you guys only used the Stones once. To bring back those that Thanos snapped away,” Alt Tony said with a frown.

Bruce nodded and elaborated, “We used them once, and well...we brought back more than just those who disappeared when Thanos snapped his fingers.” He sought out Alt Bruce’s gaze and held his eyes. “It has to be you who wears the gauntlet. You can absorb most of the gamma radiation from the Stones without killing yourself. When you make your wish, you have to think, ‘ _Safely bring back everyone who was killed directly or indirectly by Thanos and his army in the last three months._ ’”

Alt Strange was already shaking his head, because he was just a Debbie Downer. “That...that is madness. You didn’t just reverse Thanos’ destruction, you’ve played with forces beyond your understanding.”

“We were undoing what Thanos did,” Steve said sharply. “Only partially, but it was the best we could do, and we would do it again if we had a choice.”

“Why three months?” Alt Tony asked, eyes focused on Tony. 

“Because Thor asked…and because we didn’t know what would happen if we reversed Thanos’ actions any further back in time. And where would we stop? How far back do we go? So we picked a timeframe that covered the most recent battles with Thanos.” Tony started ticking of fingers on his hand as he elaborated, “We brought back a frankly small number of Asgardians, the Wakandans who died defending Earth, a colony of giant dwarves and please don’t ask me about that, and we also brought back a planet full of people that Thanos wiped out to get to the Power Stone. That was as far back as we dared to risk it.” 

Alt Strange still looked troubled. “You don’t know what you were doing with the Stones, how much damage to the fabric of the universe you could be causing with a wish like that.”

“Any more than the damage Thanos caused?” Steve asked, firm and unmoving in the face of these concerns. 

“We don’t know the extent of damage the Infinity Stones could do with repeated, careless usage,” Alt Strange insisted. 

Steve looked mutinous and Tony decided to cut in because he couldn’t see either of them ever agreeing on this. “If you don’t like what we did with the Infinity Stones, then you shouldn’t leave it to us with nothing more than a cryptic comment before you become all dust in the wind.”

Alt Tony made a face and said, “Yeah, the cryptic comments really aren’t that helpful.”

“I know right?” Tony said, pointing at his counterpart with a grin. 

That earned the two of them an eye-roll from Alt Strange.

Bruce ignored the back-and-forth, and looked at Alt Bruce instead as he said, almost gently, “Your timeline has avoided a universe-wide catastrophe, but you can still use the Stones to bring back the Asgardians and Wakandans who were killed by Thanos and his army. And that whole planet and, er, giant dwarves.”

Everyone subsided at that comment, and Tony could see the stark desperation in Alt Thor’s face, knowing what that meant for him. Alt Thor, whose decimated people had been further ravaged and killed by Thanos and his army, who had lost so much, and now looked staggered at the prospect of changing that. Much like how their Thor had looked when he had told them that half his people from their ship had been brought back to life, along with his asshole brother Loki.

Alt T’Challa and Alt Okoye looked no less hopeful, especially when they surveyed their land and the people they had lost to try to protect Earth from the consequences of Thanos’ army achieving their goal. Their steely determination in their gazes told Tony all he needed to know about the direction they would be leaning hard towards. 

Bruce continued his instructions on how to use the gauntlet and share the power surge between everyone so as to survive. At the end of it, Alt Thor looked at his teammates, eyes beseeching. “Please, my friends…”

“Yeah, of course, Thor,” Alt Natasha said immediately, putting a hand on his arm.

And then their Thor was stepping forward and sweeping Alt Thor in a bone crushing hug. Alt Thor returned it, sagging in his other self’s embrace as they both held each other and probably cried a little. Everyone looked away, giving them a quiet moment. Even Alt T’Challa was conferring with the two Okoyes about this new piece of information where the Stones could be used to revive his fallen people.

Tony looked back to his other self and noticed him staring almost hungrily at where Steve and Tony were holding hands. Those dark eyes were intense with longing, and wow, okay, Tony was starting to get why his past paramours used to wax lyrical over his eyes. For all that Alt Tony looked bone tired, those eyes were deep and framed by rather dark lashes.

Tony looked pretty hot, if Tony could say so himself.

Alt Steve clearly thought so too, since he was gazing at Alt Tony with the kind of tragic pining that Tony was really, really surprised that he had never noticed from his own Steve. And he had to say, Steve with that lush beard and dark hair that curled at the nape, blue eyes dark with longing? Geez, that was a potent look. Tony kind of wanted to pat his beard, check out how they felt against his own cheek, traced those pink lips that looked even softer when framed with perfect facial hair.

“You’re staring,” his own Steve murmured, sounding none too pleased.

“It’s technically you from two months ago,” Tony said without an ounce of shame. “You look pretty good with a beard, all sad eyes and torn clothing. Why did you shave off the beard, Sunshine?”

Steve didn’t say anything, which had Tony tearing his gaze away from the Alternate Timeline pining to stare at his own Steve. Was that…? Yes, there really was the faintest of blushes on Steve’s high cheekbones. Even the tips of his ears looked to be turning red.

Tony grinned. “Aww, Steve, are you blushing? Now I really have to know why you shaved. Come on, spill the beans.”

Meeting his eyes with no small amount of exasperation, Steve said, “I wasn’t on the run anymore, so I could shave off my disguise.”

While logical, it also sounded pretty unconvincing. Tony stared, trying to work it out. “Not much of a disguise, was it? Anyone could recognize those baby blues, that unfairly beautiful nose and those absurd cheekbones anywhere.” Then, the epiphany hit as Tony watched Steve touch his own nose in sudden self-consciousness. “Oh my god, you shaved when you thought you were going to see me? Carol was out looking for us, so you must have been hoping I would turn up— You shaved _for me_.”

“I didn’t,” Steve said, although he sounded resigned, knowing the jig was up.

“You so did,” Tony crowed. “Just so you know, I like the beard too. It’s a really good look. You don’t have to be the clean-shaven square-jawed American ideal all the time for me. The rough mountain man look is really working for me, too.”

Tony turned back to look at the Alternate Timeline versions of themselves now talking in low voices, before continuing idly, “And I gotta say, I don’t look half bad myself, all roughed up and in a battered armor. There’s a kind of rugged charm to it. Do you think they’ll be up for a foursome, maybe?”

Suddenly, Tony felt himself pulled right up against Steve’s side by their joined hands. Tony turned and looked up at Steve, who had his other hand against his cheek. Steve’s blue eyes were bright with mischief but also with a little hint of heat.

“Maybe other you might be up for it. But I can guarantee, neither versions of me will be up for sharing,” Steve said, before leaning down to kiss Tony, sealing his lips over Tony’s surprised gasp.

It was a quick, hard kiss, but the passion behind it was unmistakable. When Steve pulled back, Tony had to force himself not to chase after his lips, not to lean harder against the solid, warm body.

“Um, message received,” Tony said, blinking slowly. He turned in a slight daze to see many shocked faces, but especially Alt Steve and Alt Tony’s. “I think message received from all parties.”

Steve said to Alt Steve and Alt Tony, “Talk it out. It’ll be worth it.”

Clearing his throat, Tony tried to regain his composure and added, “Yeah, you’ll get there, but you have to try.”

He watched as Alt Tony and Alt Steve looked at each other again, exchanging long, uncertain looks. But something in their shared silent communication was enough to highlight to Tony that yeah, they would be okay. They would work it out too.

“Alright, guys, time to head back,” Steve said, calling out to where their Thor was talking to Alt Thor and Alt Bruce, and to their Bruce who was awkwardly talking to Alt Natasha.

Shuri looked over from her deep conversation with Alt Shuri and Alt Peter. “Can I stay, please? We could do so much with our brains combined!”

But Okoye was already grabbing her by the elbow and towing her back to Steve and Tony. Shuri grumbled all the way, but she came. Soon, everyone was assembled, just a small distance away from the rest of the people from this alternate timeline.

Tony looked over at Alt Tony and couldn’t help but emphasize the previous advice. “Yell it all out and throw things at each other. I found arc reactors and cups really satisfying personally. But be sure to talk it out afterwards, Baby Us.”

Alt Tony got it immediately, which was the expected result when they both had the same brains. “We’re 65 days younger than you are, we’re not babies.”

“You really should listen to your older and wiser selves,” Tony said with faux gravitas, trying not to grin.

“Am I always this bossy?” Alt Tony asked, shaking his head, but he was starting to smile.

“Always,” Steve replied, which was just rude. Then Steve also imparted some old man advice, “Take care of each other.”

Alt Steve nodded and raised a tired hand in goodbye. “Same to you.”

That was enough said then. Tony looked Alt Thor already talking to Alt Bruce and Alt Natasha with a new kind of hope in his eyes. He looked at the way Alt Steve and Alt Tony watched them, looked at the longing and hope in their eyes, and he thought they would be okay. They would all be okay.

It was time to go home.

\---

Everyone stayed up way past midnight, as if reluctant to go to sleep and find out it was all just a dream. Most of everyone who hadn’t lived at the Avengers compound before had gone home to their families and loved ones, mostly through the sling ring version of Apparating. The wizards were pretty helpful when it came to quick transportation; Strange could make a killing if he decided to be a taxi service instead.

The Avengers, old, new and unofficial, sat up for hours in the common area, talking and rehashing what had happened over and over again, mostly for those people who hadn’t been there. It had been a delight, watching Steve look around the room with soft eyes, just pure happiness in his gaze as he took in everyone they had lost whom they had managed to save again.

Steve was flanked by Bucky and Sam for most of the night, sticking close to them as if afraid they would disappear on him if he looked away. It spoke of how shaken Steve had been by the whole event, how he was letting his strong and steady front drop enough that Bucky and Sam could sense his sheer relief along with his current of subconscious worry that they would be gone. They cracked jokes by Steve’s side, seemingly trying to compete on who could make Steve laugh and grin the most.

Tony felt the same way as Steve. He would have Peter right here by his side, ensuring he was still there and _solid and whole_ every few minutes, if he hadn’t had to send him home to his Aunt May. But he wasn’t struggling with having Peter out of his sights — _yet_ — because Peter was blowing up his phone with constant messages, updating Tony on everything he was seeing and who he had talked to and how everything was blowing his mind.

Most of the night was spent leaning against Rhodey’s shoulder and just taking in everyone’s presence, letting the conversation wash over him.

“Okay, time for bed, Tony,” Rhodey said a little fondly, nudging him in the side. “My shoulder can’t make for a comfortable pillow.

So maybe he was actually drifting off to sleep now. Not moving an inch, he grumbled, “It’s the comfiest pillow, shaddup.”

“I’ll take him,” came Steve’s warm and amused voice, a hand already tugging on his elbow.

“He’s all yours, Cap,” Rhodey agreed, pushing Tony gently off the couch.

Tony went willingly into Steve’s arms. The conversations and animated voices continued as Steve led Tony to the elevators, an arm around his waist.

They both went about brushing their teeth, using the bathroom and undressing before bed, moving together comfortably like they had been doing this for years instead of days at most, not counting the time spent in the infirmary. Steve headed off to bed first while Tony got delayed in his walk-in closet when he received a call from Peter.

Peter narrated how emotional Aunt May was and how they had to clean the apartment since it was dusty, and thanked Tony for paying their rent and bills so they still had a home and all the utilities. 

“Then I talked to Ned on the phone, and he was crying so hard, I had to swing over to check if he was okay. He was dusted too and I think his parents are never going to let him out of their sight ever. Is it bad to say, but I’m glad Aunt May didn’t have to think that I was gone for good? Because…she was gone with me?” His voice went small and quiet at the end there, a little ashamed about what he had just said.

Tony remembered his own cowardly thoughts about how glad he had been that he hadn’t needed to tell May that Peter was gone, that he hadn’t had to face her, that she hadn’t had to face Peter’s…absence.

“No, I don’t think you’re bad to think that,” Tony said, a little quietly too. “I think she probably feels the same. You should talk to her. She could probably do with someone to talk through what happened. And you know if I’m recommending you talk about your feelings, there must be really serious shit going on.”

Peter huffed out a short laugh. “You’re not that bad at talking, Mister Stark.”

Tony rolled his eyes even though Peter couldn’t see it. “That’s an outright lie. Okay, go, go. What are you doing up at three in the morning anyway? Your aunt’s going to kill me if she catches you talking to me on the phone.”

“Nah, she’s still awake outside as well, I can hear her watching the news,” Peter explained. “Okay, I’ll go talk to her now, tell her I can’t sleep. Bye, Mister Stark!”

“Bye, Spider-Kid,” Tony said, smiling softly as the call ended.

He waved his hand at the closet door and it slid upon, the embedded tech ready to respond to his gestures and voice. Reaching for the nearest sleepwear, he pulled out a soft, threadbare T-shirt that had art of Iron Man ironing underwear on it, along with a comfortable pair of pajama pants. Yes, he wore fan merchandise of Iron Man to sleep, what was wrong with that?

When he strolled out of the walk-in closet, he found Steve already in bed but with a projection playing out at the foot of the bed. It was a recording of Tony, being projected from an old battered Iron Man helmet in the middle of the mattress. Oh, oops. Probably should have remembered to hide that before getting ready for bed. Tony paused there, watching the recording play out.

 _“Everybody wants a happy ending, right? But it doesn't always roll that way. Maybe this time…”_ Steve’s face seemed frozen in a frown as he watched Tony’s projection. But the rest of the recording wasn’t too bad...maybe?

_“I'm hoping if you play this back, it's in celebration. I hope families are reunited, I hope we get it back, and something like a normal version of the planet has been restored…if there ever was such a thing.”_

_“God, what a world. Universe, now. If you told me 10 years ago that we weren't alone, let alone to this extent..._ _I mean, I wouldn't have been surprised, but come on. These epic forces of darkness and light that have come into play, for better or worse, that's the reality we all have to live in.”_

Tony winced at his own melodrama and childish wonder at the universe that had opened up before them, for all its terribleness and awesomeness. This was definitely a bit awkward to listen in on.

_“So I found a private area to record a little greeting in case of an untimely death on my part. Not that death at any time is ever timely.”_

Oh boy, Steve probably wasn’t going to like this part, and...yep, from the way Steve’s lips tightened, he wasn’t wrong. 

_“This time travel thing we’re going to try to pull off tomorrow, I’m scratching my head at the survivability of it. That’s the thing…maybe everything will work out the way it’s supposed to, maybe not. Then again, that’s the hero gig. Part of the journey is the end—”_

The projection flickered off as Steve leaned forward and touched the helmet, cutting off the last couple words of the recording. He touched the face of the old Iron Man helmet on the mattress, almost cupping the cold metal. His eyelashes looked a little damp in the low light as he leaned back again.

Steve looked up at Tony, obviously having known he had been there the whole time. “You couldn’t have told me that instead?”

Shaking his head, Tony drew closer until he reached the bed and moved the Iron Man helmet back to the bedside table. “It was meant to be something to remember me by, just in case.”

Steve reached out and pulled Tony down onto the bed, folding him into a tight hug. He pressed his lips to Tony’s hairline, breathed in deep like he just needed to savor the fact that Tony was still here. Tony’s arms had wrapped around Steve’s waist of their own accord, squeezing tight and relishing in the solid feel of Steve in his arms, Steve being here and now, _alive_. They had done it, and they had made it through together.

“You left the helmet on the bedside table without a note,” Steve said suddenly, drawing back so he could frown down at Tony. “What if I hadn’t made it either? Then no one would have gotten the message.”

Tony shifted into a cross-legged position on the bed and picked up Steve’s big hand, squeezing it. “I didn’t let myself think about that.”

They sat there in silence for a moment, Tony letting Steve absorb the video he had just watched while he gently traced the lines on Steve’s hand. They were such strong, capable hands, large enough to envelope Tony’s own but so gentle when they touched Tony.

Steve closed his hand on Tony’s fingers and brought them up to his own lips, gently kissing them.

“Sap,” Tony said with a smile even as warmth blossomed in him.

“I’m not the one who left a message about how amazing the world was and how it was part of the journey to die,” Steve said, shooting Tony a dark look from beneath his lashes in contrast to the second soft kiss he pressed to Tony’s hand. Then he pulled Tony closer to press a kiss to his lips instead.

Tony sighed, letting himself lean into Steve’s kiss, folding himself around Steve so they were entangled and embraced. They kissed, soft and unhurried, like they had all the time in the world. They kissed until they both lay down on their sides, sharing the same pillow and just enjoying the touch and feel of their bodies pressed close.

Tony blinked slowly, eyes tracing Steve’s beautiful face and memorizing every line.

“What are you planning to do now?” Steve asked softly, gently drawing a finger from Tony’s hairline, down his cheek to trace against the sharp edge of his facial hair.

“Stare at you until I fall asleep,” Tony replied with a lopsided smile.

Steve rolled his eyes, which looked a bit funny when the side of his face was squished against a pillow. “That’s not what I meant.”

As Tony mulled over the question seriously, Steve continued tracing the lines on Tony’s face with his fingers. Tony turned and pressed a kiss to Steve’s index finger before answering, “The world is still kind of messed up after everything that happened, so I thought I might focus on helping with the clean-up and rebuilding. But I’ll still be Iron Man. Maybe I’ll be a back-up Avenger.”

Steve nodded slowly and said, “That makes sense.”

“What about you?” Tony asked curiously. He started prodding Steve in his absurd abs when he didn’t answer right away.

Steve caught his poking finger and pulled Tony’s hand to his chest instead, cradling it there. “I haven’t decided yet. I think maybe it’s time to pass the shield on.”

That really surprised Tony, but when he examined Steve’s blue gaze, there was nothing in his eyes but calm and contentment. He raised his eyebrows. “Really? You’re retiring?”

“No, I don’t think I could. But I think I want to spend more time training all the new people we have rather than leading a team. Take a bit more of a backseat. Become a back-up Avenger, like you,” Steve said thoughtfully.

“Anyone in mind to be the next Cap?” Tony asked, although he already had an inkling.

“I think Sam will do a good job,” Steve said with a smile.

Tony nodded slowly, still processing. “Yeah, I think he will.” Already, Tony’s mind was churning out all the possible uniform and wing upgrades he could do for Sam, to accommodate for the shield, too.

“You know that life you’ve talked about in the past, Tony. And how I would get there,” Steve mentioned almost idly as he traced a nonsense pattern on the back of Tony’s hand. “I’m thinking I’ll try out some of that life now.”

Grinning, Tony leaned in for a kiss, and Steve met him halfway. When they parted, just a few inches apart, Tony just said, “Let’s start the planning stage.”

Steve smiled at him, eyes creasing with hapless wonder. “Day one…” he said, and then kissed Tony.

Tony liked the sound of that. Day one to the rest of their lives…

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going to be a long note but I'm just going to go for it anyway because I've got so much to say!
> 
> I love Tony’s recorded speech at the end of Endgame, so I had to include it here too. But I do think Tony would feel a bit awkward and critical listening to his own earnest words, so that’s why he was a bit negative about it. 
> 
> I wrote this because I liked Endgame but I wanted to try achieving a happy ending where no one dies by simplifying the Infinity Stones heist, and I wanted to write team feels. I wanted a happy ending for Steve and Tony in the present timeline, and a happy ending for the others as well, like Thor, the Asgardians, the Wakandans, etc. 
> 
> I really enjoyed writing this so much. It was very fun and kind of crazy. I had to remember the linear sequence of events even as I fucked with the timelines, and there were so many characters to juggle even though I did focus primarily on Tony and Steve. When I was editing, I kept discovering that I had forgotten about Clint completely and then later, that I had overcompensated by adding him into scenes when he hadn’t even been found yet. Anyway, I’m delighted canon brought all the characters together but I wanted even more interaction which is why I’ve squeezed more in here. 
> 
> I want to thank [Coaster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/coaster/pseuds/coaster) again because omg, she caught so many issues and helped so much, especially in the last two chapters. Without her help, I’m not sure I would have ever posted this!
> 
> And thank you to [LemonGrenade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemonGrenade/pseuds/LemonGrenade) for listening to me whine ceaselessly about editing this story! Funny story: I initially told LemonGrenade about this story and how I planned for it to be 5000 words long. She was...very doubtful. HAHA, and she was right! I have no ability to estimate the length of my own stories. 😅
> 
> Thank you so much to everyone who has followed my updates and for all the lovely and encouraging comments! You’ve been amazing and I hope you like the wrap up! For the new readers, I hope it’s been a fun read, and thank you for taking the time to finish it! 💕
> 
> If you liked the story, you can also reblog it [here on Tumblr](https://awesomelifechoices.tumblr.com/post/186606441778/fic-saving-the-world-is-a-12-step-program)!


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